First Generation Student attending College of Marin

People often say that classes at a community college are a lot easier relative to a four year college. From, my personal experience attending College of Marin for 6 weeks as a full-time student, I can surely tell you that classes are not as easy as one predicts them to be. Transitioning from High School to College has not being easy especially for a first generation Hispanic like myself. My first couple weeks of school were the toughest because I had to adapt to the college environment and learn how to get around campus. Learning to get around campus was hard as well as learning to handle such an immense amount of homework every week. Managing time to do all my homework and reading was and is still a challenge, I still struggle to overcome. One of the nice things was that I've got involved in the College of Marin Puente Program, which provides a mentor, counselor and English teachers especially for the Puente Students, who help us go in the right track towards transferring to a four year college and give us support along the way. 

I commute to College of Marin from my home, which is about a 35 minute drive with traffic. My college life is as I expected, I only go to school two days a week and the rest of the days I spent doing homework or working. I didn't expect much difference because I’m living home with my parents, so I still have priorities at home. The only impression I have is from, the amount of homework professors give out. I have done as much reading in these 6 weeks of college as I would have done in a semester of school in high school. The reading a students has to do for homework in such a short time is insane especially since I’m not a person who loves reading for free time. 

After attending these past weeks at College of Marin, I am looking forward to getting my general eds classes done by this year and start my intended major classes. I am also looking forward to the events that the Puente Program has store for us and meeting more new people. I am looking forward to next semester because I will be joining the track team and hopefully I’ll learn how to manage my time wisely too keeping up with the reading and homework of each class.

-Julio, College of Marin '14