<p>I will attend University of Colorado Boulder with a strong residential life as a commuter. They have a live-in requirement but I’m exempt: I’ll live in a house my parents own nearby, with my brother (also going to start as freshman there), but without parents.</p>
<p>I got the exemption letter already from the live-in requirement. It takes 30 minutes to drive between house <=> car park for commuters @ university.</p>
<p>Now here is the question: I know I am at a loss for social life. I’m not super anxious, nor am I craving for wild parties, but I’m afraid of being let out of action since I’ll not be around in the dorms. However, I’m also not super confident around people, especially girls.</p>
<p>Besides spending as much time on campus as I can, what else should I do?</p>
<p>Living on campus looses it’s luster after freshman year. After that everyone wants to live off campus! lol</p>
<p>I had a couple of friends that were commuters my freshman year. You can instantly tell if a commuter is social or not by how much they interact with the campus. We had a lot of commuters that went to classes and went home; they didn’t have a social life because they chose to do so. There were others who stuck around campus and interacted with students; they were great people to hang out with.</p>
<p>One of my friends who was a commuter would hang out at the campus coffee house until closing time and do homework/hang out with friends. She made close friends with a couple of girls on campus, so she would even occasionally have sleepovers with her friends in the dorms. Her on campus friends would even go to her house to spend the night - and do laundry! (Here is a tip: Tell on campus students that you have a nice washer and dryer. They will be at your house all the time!)</p>
<p>My three biggest tips:</p>
<p>1) Commit to being a part of campus life. Even though you don’t live on campus doesn’t mean you can’t be a part of the campus. Join clubs and campus activities! There are so many freebies and amenities on campus to use. When you feel antisocial, revert to this mantra: “I will be social! I will be a part of campus life! I will have fun!”</p>
<p>2) Hang around campus all the time! Usually when the on campus students were in their dorms, they were either sleeping or watching TV. At my uni everyone hangs around the campus coffee house or the library until closing time (midnight) and does homework or just goofs off. You need to designate a few days a week to spend the whole day at the campus and use the campus amenities or do homework/hang out around the campus. Also, you can still buy a small meal plan and eat breakfast, lunch, or dinner with friends.</p>
<p>3) Push yourself to be social and make friends. This is pretty self-explanatory, but it needs repeating. Go to campus events, make acquaintances with classmates, ask to swap numbers with people that you share the same major. Be proactive and social with people. Once you make a close-ish friend, ask if you could spend the night at their dorm (a lot of people did this at my uni)!</p>
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<p>Note: The two biggest tips I learned in making friends/acquaintances my freshman year were to 1) sit at lunch with random people and strike up a conversation and 2) Swap numbers with classmates (a big plus in multiple ways!).</p>
<p>Now I realized since I commute I’ll have an easier place to park my car! That is great.</p>
<p>Do people in dorms normally let people who don’t live there to participate in activities like parties or hangouts? Not in the sense of “allowing” but like inviting other friends not from the dorms?</p>
<p>Finally, a tricky question: do my dating chances get decreased much by not living on campus?</p>
<p>If you are proactive at the beginning of the semester you should be able to find two or three friends who do live on campus and are willing to invite you to campus events. Go to orientation and stuff, and stick around people’s rooms.</p>
<p>Join a couple of groups and also make it a point to join the commuter’s association. Attend several evening functions early before weather becomes an issue for your drive.</p>
<p>I don’t know about all universities, but a lot of the commuters at my uni had friends that would let them sleepover. One of my friends would sometimes spend the weekends at her other friend’s dorm and vice-versa. I guess it depends on the friends you make! I lived on campus, but I always had friends going home with me on weekends or during breaks.</p>
<p>As for dating… I don’t think it should be your biggest concern. College dating is rather weird in the first place. But, I don’t think being a commuter would hurt your chances. This girl that I was talking about, even though she didn’t actually date, had a lot of guys that were interested in her. She was very academically driven, so she rather turned them down! lol</p>
<p>I think the biggest advice I have for you is to not act like the stereotypical commuter student. Be a part of the university and enjoy it!</p>
<p>IThink has good ideas. I was going to mention the lunch thing. Tag along with classmates headed for lunch. It’s the easiest downtime way to integrate yourself. Just don’t be creepy about it. Relate normally and it makes sense. That’s pretty much how dorm kids do it. Maybe you’ll have a partial meal plan. </p>
<p>Don’t just join things where you are faceless. Join where you can play a role- outdoor activities are a good start. (Frisbee, intramurals, outing club, some cause or vol work. Group things.) </p>
<p>My kids’ dorms have key card access. But, if you can get in to watch sports, and show up regularly, there’s a funny thing where others start to assume you are part of the group.</p>
<p>Try to get involved in activities that are on campus and that involve a lot of face-time with other students. These can take the form of organizations that have a lot of socials or activities that they do as a group, intramural sports, maybe different rec classes, or even getting a job on campus (esp. one in which you will be working with a lot of other students, like a dining hall). Perhaps set up study groups in your classes, and try to go to the events that happen at the beginning of the year (dances, fairs, etc).</p>
<p>If you’re school has a high amount of residential life, chances are many freshmen may not have cars on campus. You may be even more popular because you have a car =D Once you start meeting people, perhaps you could invite people to go to a local restaurant or other outing and offer to drive.</p>
<p>What is a “stereotypical commuter student”?</p>
<p>Anyway, I’ll get a meal plan that covers lunch, since I don’t intend on coming back home.</p>
<p>Now, a bit more context: my parents are actually moving out of the house. They are kinda tired of taking care of the house (which isn’t big, but is in a semi-rural part of the county so it has a lot of work to be done on the outside) and will live most of the time on a city flat they own. But they don’t plan on selling the house, and kinda left me stuck between living at uni and then paying all costs for dorms (which are insanely expensive and would require loans $$) or staying on the house.</p>
<p>My brother, which will also attend the same university, is going to be living here as well.</p>
<p>I was afraid of missing something important by commuting, but my parents are reluctant on the dorm expense and I don’t think 30 weeks of dorm like are worth the $ 6,000 and not getting the decent car I got to go to college.</p>
<p>I don’t think you’ll miss anything incredibly important by commuting. Commuting is tiring, but you can still be as involved in college as you want to be. There are likely students that live on campus and are still very uninvolved in campus life. It’s about how involved a student chooses to be.</p>
<p>My school had a commuter lounge and a commuter organization (that also has lots of fun events, such as free breakfast, etc). Perhaps, you could see if your school has something similar.</p>
<p>A “stereotypical commuter student” is just a commuter who goes to class and then goes home and has no school spirit whatsoever (that’s how I see it at least). Kids living on campus also sometimes like to look down on those who commute…though I’m not exactly sure why.</p>
<p>I agree with all the above responses about joining clubs and stick around on campus. Seriously, stick around on campus because if you make friends with the people living on campus, they might not have cars and it would not be convenient for them to hang out with you unless you can be found on campus.</p>
<p>Oooh! So you will have the house to yourself (well… and your brother)? The biggest perk of living on campus is being free and living on your own away from your family, but you will pretty much be doing that already. </p>
<p>I say stay at that house! It will be much nicer than a dorm and you will save some money. Usually, dorming is equal to the cost of renting plus food, so it is economical for students to live in the dorms on loans. In your situation, you have your living situation covered (for free, I hope), which is really nice. Some of my friends and myself were considering renting a house sometime in the next few years because it is the same cost compared to living in the dorms.</p>
<p>Yes, living in the dorms is a great experience, but your situation is actually good. Make some friends and invite them over for a movie night or a get-together! Believe me… the friends that you make at college will be at your house all the time! My mom moved a hour away from my college and I go home twice a month - I always have friends spending the weekend at my house!</p>