While the population of Kennesaw State students who choose to live on or close by campus is growing, there are still many students who commute to campus each day.
Commuting can make enjoying campus life tough for some of these students.
Junior information technology major Stewart Zwald — who has a 30 minute commute without traffic — pointed out that many events take place in the evenings, sometimes as late as 7 p.m., while the majority of classes take place in the morning and early afternoon.
“[It is] harder to make friends because I commute and I can’t do anything around campus mainly because once class is over I am ready to go home and do work for my other classes,” Zwald said. “I have had to turn down a couple people that wanted to do something after class because I had to get home and beat the traffic.”
The lack of time to socialize and make friends is frustrating to some commuter students and can lead them to feel isolated. College is often thought of as the time to be networking and forming some of the most meaningful relationships.
Freshman psychology major Kalah Truett — who drives an hour and 20 minutes each day to class — missed events related to KSU’s Constitution Week because, ironically, she had to attend her American Government course.
Hearing of an interesting event, only to find out it occurs at the same time as a class is extremely frustrating to these students.
“[My class schedule has] made me miss an event before,” Zwald said. “I have [had] classes before that were in the afternoon and the professor in my last class before the event would sometimes hold us late, and it would cause me to miss the event. Or I have had classes before that start right when the event did.”
Another problem plaguing commuters is cancelled classes. An event may occur in a professor’s life that causes them to cancel class. Unfortunately for the commuter student, the news can reach them too late causing them to arrive at an empty classroom.
Zwald shared an experience he had during his sophomore year when his class was cancelled.
“It was my only class I had on Friday’s [sic] and it started at 10 a.m. [The] professor sent an email while I was driving and I didn’t check my email until I parked on campus,” Zwald said.
Recognizing the problem, Zwald and Truett also found solutions.
“[I had] only one class one day and it was cancelled at the last minute. Since I only had [American Government,] I had scheduled an appointment with my advisor. I went to the appointment anyway and I spent the day at the library,” Truett said.
“Another way to improve [this issue for me] is to have my classes spaced out a little more, so there are longer breaks between classes and I can attend events,” Zwald said.
Students who commute face many difficulties with campus life, whether those are the requirements of college classes and coursework or the difficulties of making friends in a new environment.
To reach the Adult and Commuter Student Affairs, visit the website.
