College Forum: Ismail Abalo-Toga

Throughout my life, something that I have always been able to do is envision parts of my future. No, I don’t claim to have superpowers and I’m pretty sure people everywhere do the same thing. It is not that hard to create scenarios about the future in your head. I say all of that to tell everyone, I could NOT do the same thing for college. Maybe it was because I never visited the campus before leaving New York, or because of the new Covid policies that completely changed the landscape of college. Or maybe because I honestly never thought I would make it this far. Where I’m from, high school is usually the end of the line for schooling and this mentality was kind of instilled in me as I grew up. Of course, my family would never allow me to be complacent with a high school degree and that worked in my favor. This, combined with going to a very competitive high school helped me realize that high school graduation(or lack thereof for the Class of 2020) was only the beginning of the road.

And now I’m here. And this first month of college has felt a lot more like a year. It started with room quarantine for two days where my roommate and I built a bond that is still extremely strong. I would say I started learning a lot about myself after we were finally released into the wild. In the weeks leading up to moving to Vermont, I found myself constantly worrying about making new friends because I hadn’t had to do it for 4 years. I had a group of very close friends in highschool and never worried about making any more. For those of you who know me personally, this may come as a surprise because I am quite social and come off as a person who doesn’t get shy. Most of my fears were rooted in the fact that I was going to a predominantly white institution as a black man and felt that people would steer away from someone who did not look like the rest. What I envisioned happened to be the exact opposite of how things played out. People really wanted to get to know me and I was genuinely shocked by the amount of people who would come up to me and just start talking to me. I accidentally became popular amongst the first-years on campus because I was known for always wearing my very distinguishable backpack. It got to the point where I was meeting too many people and could not remember any names even though they would remember mine. My fears of not being able to make friends almost immediately dissipated when I realized that after 3 months of quarantining, students were just as eager as I was to meet new people.

I feel like I’ve talked about everything except what people really want to know about. Academic life! That was a joke by the way. I need to first start off by saying that the website that I used to register for classes crashed and by the time I got in, a lot of the classes that I wanted to take were full. One thing that I want to tell you guys is that there is no rush to decide a major or to take “hard” courses so you feel like you're being as productive as possible. All courses are educational regardless of the topic. Even though I never thought I would take an acting course and was really disappointed when it was the only thing that would fit into my schedule, it has easily become one of my favorite classes. My main piece of advice for your first semester is to take a class that’s related to your intended major, take a class in a subject that you are interested in that has nothing to do with your major, and finally, take a class that is completely foreign to you. This combination has a little bit of everything and has worked for me pretty well. Of course, everyone has their own plans coming into college so take this advice with a grain of salt. If you have no clue what you're aiming for, try out my suggestion.

I feel like the strategy that Middlebury employed when it came to inviting us into the world of college education was throwing us in at the deep end but giving us a whole bunch of floaties so we don’t actually drown. There was no slow transition. Teachers immediately gave us our syllabi and all of my classes had an assignment due for our next class session. I’m not saying this to give any of you anxiety. My goal is to be as transparent as possible. Coming from a highschool that gave a lot of work, I did not suffer much and was able to transition pretty seamlessly. I did, however, see other people start to drown and this is where Middlebury and most other institutions throw the floaties at you. There are resources everywhere and it’s easy to forget about them when you feel overwhelmed. Tutors, understanding professors, studying centers, and therapists on campus are only a few of the resources that are offered to students. Make use of them when you need them but also, make use of them when you don’t need them.

In five days, it will be a month since I moved to college and honestly speaking, the experience is what you make of it. Have fun, be responsible, and most of all, enjoy yourself.

Also, I’ll add a picture of my backpack and I just in case anybody was curious.