Transitioning from high school to college: building a foundation for success
Here at Chicago Home Tutor, our executive functioning coaches work with many students who are in late high school or early college. The article is written to help students prepare for the transition from one to the other!
You already have some foundational executive functioning skills!
For those of you who have already been accepted into college, you’ve proven you have developed some foundational executive functioning skills!
First, you had to determine what you wanted to study in college (or at least have a vague idea). Then you had to research different universities to determine which ones offered programs you were interested in and also were a good fit for you.
There were requirements for test scores, GPAs, and class prerequisites to meet the admissions criteria, and everything had to be completed by the various deadlines.
Transitioning to more independence
If you are like most high school students, your parents, guidance counselor, and/or other adults in your life helped you navigate most of this process; however, now that you have been accepted, you have the opportunity to harness the strength of your executive functioning skills to handle most of this on your own.
Following are some tips for how to navigate this life-changing transition organized by the executive functioning areas in which they support.
Flexible thinking
If you are going away to a college campus, you probably have a whole list of preconceived notions about how campus life will be. You’ve watched the movies, YouTube, and TikTok videos, and maybe even read a book or two about this momentous coming-of-age experience.
Brace yourself…..your experience will probably NOT be all that you are thinking it will be - especially during that first semester or two away from home.
Your roommates might be difficult, you’ll get lost on more than one occasion, and you’re going to be amazed at how much you didn’t know that you needed to know. This is where your ability to demonstrate flexible thinking will be crucial.
Have backup plans
If something doesn’t go the way you planned, you are going to have to figure out a new plan. Often in high school, you were asked about a “Plan B” in regards to your career or college choices. Now that you’re in college, you may need a Plan C, D, and E…. and a way to figure out what to do when a situation comes up for which there isn’t a plan at all.
Lean on your support network
You will want to develop a support network whether it be with your roommates, dorm mates, resident advisor, study group, or through a club or sports participation.
College is not the time to try and go it alone, so be flexible enough to go out of your comfort zone to develop relationships that will support you or to ask for help from others when needed.
Impulse and emotional control
I’ve put these two together because they often go hand in hand. There is nothing wrong with feeling the whole range of emotions, even the so-called negative ones such as anger, resentment, sadness, and anxiety. It is what you do with those emotions and how you choose to demonstrate them that matters.
There are healthy and unhealthy ways to deal with our feelings, and that is something that is often exacerbated for young adults heading off for college and the independence that brings. Be mindful of how you handle your big feelings and avoid just following your impulses.
Part of learning how to be an adult is learning strategies to help you regulate your emotions, referred to as coping skills. Things such as journaling, listening to music, deep breathing, meditation, exercise, and even coloring are examples of tools that you can utilize to help manage your emotions. Try one of these ideas out the next time you are feeling big emotions to determine which one of them works the best for you.
College is not the time to try and go it alone, so be flexible enough to go out of your comfort zone to develop relationships that will support you or to ask for help from others when needed.
Planning, prioritizing, and organization
Planning, prioritization and organization are the areas that usually cause the most challenges for new college students. From the moment you arrive on campus, you are solely responsible for keeping track of your classes, assignments, due dates, social events, dining hall hours and everything else.
In order to be the most successful, you will need to determine a system for keeping track of all of this information. Here are some tips to set yourself up for success:
The more visual you can make it, the better.
There are many planner apps available for your phone, but don’t downplay the value of writing information down in a physical planner or calendar.
Whichever you choose, try using a color-coding system to help visually process everything. For example, write all of your assignments and due dates for one class in one color. Do this for each class, and when you view your planner you will easily see what needs to be completed by which date and for what class.
When given an assignment, be sure to read it over thoroughly so you can plan accordingly for what you need to do to complete it.
Map out the specific details of steps needed to complete an assignment instead of just writing on the calendar “English Paper Due.” For example, if you have a research paper due six weeks from now, determine what steps you need to take to complete the paper (e.g. deciding a topic, conducting research, completing a rough draft, editing/revising, polishing a final draft). In high school, your teachers often assigned due dates for each of these steps. In college, your professors will often just give you the date of when the final paper is due. You are going to have to determine the small steps/tasks needed in order to have the final project ready on time.
Don’t hesitate to use tools and supports when you need them! There are lots of free executive functioning tools and apps available, so start practicing them now!
Experiencing success in college is not going to just happen. However, if you are able to build a strong foundation early in your college career, you will be setting yourself up for success throughout college and beyond.
If you’d like some help preparing and making this transition, contact us today to learn more about executive functioning coaching!
About the author:
Kimberly Frey studied exceptional education and is licensed by the Illinois State Board of Education as a learning behavior specialist. She has been teaching for almost 20 years and currently works as a diverse learners resource teacher and a math extended impact teacher for Chicago Public Schools.
