Students Who Feel Emotionally Unprepared for College Struggle in the Classroom

An online survey was recently administered by the Harris Poll that looked at the emotional preparedness of students to attend college and how those that were less emotionally prepared fared versus their peers. The survey sponsors were the Jed Foundation, a nonprofit group that works to protect the emotional and mental health of students, the Partnership for Drug-Free Kids, and the Jordan Porco Foundation, which tries to prevent suicide among high-school and college students.

Students who feel less emotionally prepared for college than their peers tend to have lower grades and other negative experiences on campus, according to the survey results.

It’s no surprise that the transition from high school to college can be a challenge. But the study’s findings emphasize how many students feel emotional needs take a back seat to academics during their process of preparing for campus life. Two out of three students surveyed said they felt more emotionally unprepared than their peers in both their final year of high school and their first semester of college. The effects of that perception manifest themselves in a variety of places, including the classroom.

The study’s conclusion: To ensure students’ academic success, high schools, colleges, and parents must do more to teach students how to cope with what they may feel — not just how to study.

What can you do to help your students be more emotionally prepared? A first start would be to set their expectations about what going away to college will entail. At the recent NACAC conference in San Diego I heard about several schools that are having Summer Camps between the junior and senior year of high school to better prepare their students for college. Academics are of course a focus of these camps but including other tracts for students on what to expect when they go way to school might be a good start and help them become less apprehensive about the experience.

Here is a link to the original story which includes a link to the complete survey results. Students Who Feel Emotionally Unprepared for College Struggle in the Classroom