Students Battle Anxiety, Stress

Everybody heard it in high school. College is great. Intellectual stimulation and parties abound. The hardest part about Harvard is getting in. They'll be the best years of your life.

But many first-year students say reality is proving to be different. The work load is already overwhelming. They partied more in high school.

Expectations are not being met.

"I truly feel that college is an overrated experience," says Gregory J. Davis '94. "When you're in high school, you hear from your older friends that college is so cool, but when you get there, you realize that it's not as great as it was made out to be."

"Lots of people told me that once you get into Harvard you can relax," says Zhiyi Yu '94. "That's not true."

False preconceptions often cause emotional, academic and social stress among first-year students, according to Daniel R. Gordon '91, co-director of Room 13, a peer counseling organization.

"Often you come to college with a set of expectations that aren't met," he said. "Your feelings may not change until your expectations change to what you've found."

Goldner said that first-year students often feel isolated and alone, and do not realize that many of their peers are experiencing the same feelings. "It's a lot more common than the people who are going through it think," he said.

First-year stress can become particularly acute during the month of October, which studies have shown is the toughest for college students of all ages.

In 1988, the most recent year for which figures are available, the highest percentage of suicides among college students occured in October, said Nancy Marsten, program director of Samaritans Suicide Prevention in Boston. She said that with the end of the initial adjustment of moving in and beginning classes comes the "real adjustment--finding friends, having relationships or not having them."

"People are trying to find who they are and what they want," she said, adding that this period can be especially hard on first-year students. "Even for the most adjusted person, freshman year can be extremely difficult."

However, David A. Smith '94 said he has escaped the first-year angst phenomenon, attributing this to the low initial expectations he brought with him. "If you come here expecting beautiful women with silk veils to dance around your bed, you will be acutely disappointed," he said.

Nonetheless, first-year pressures affect many first-year students at Harvard. And some attribute their insecurities to the simple fact that Harvard is Harvard.

"I've been thinking from the beginning, `Why me?'" Davis said. "Is it because they don't have many Southern Black musically-inclined science concentrators on campus?"

Meg H. Gleason '94, on the other hand, says her discomfiture stems from her perception that the Harvard she has found is not the Harvard fabled in song and story.

"I'm enjoying my classes, but I'm not sitting there thinking, `Wow, number one on U.S. News' list--it doesn't get any better than this,'" she said. "I haven't met anyone whom just speaking to overwhelmed me."