High school to post-secondary: The stereotypes live on

Header image for Interrobang article CREDIT: AMY SCOTT
A student discusses how her experience in a joint program reflects the same stereotypes she faced in high school.

When I was in high school, I took strictly university-level classes. Even though I now know that I would have benefited from taking the occasional college-level course, I felt a certain pressure from peers, teachers and society to take university-level courses. I am definitely not the first person to notice that there is a stigma around college-level courses. Many believe that taking university-level courses means that you are more intelligent than those in college-level courses.

During high school, I believed those stereotypes and as a result, never even considered college-level courses. However, because I didn't take these courses, I never got to hear about the benefits of college as a post-secondary institution. Even if I was incredibly intimidated by university, I wouldn't even consider college because I didn't want anyone to think I was “unintelligent” or trying to follow the “easy path” in life.

It wasn't until grade 11 that I learned to stop believing these stereotypes. I remember sitting down with one of my co-workers at my part-time job at my local library. She told me all about the benefits of college when she used to attend and why she thinks it is the best path some can take. This really changed my perspective, as I was so used to peers and teachers saying that university was the best option for me.

It wasn't until grade 12 when I was doing intense university research that I discovered joint programs. A joint program is a program where a student can take classes at both a college and university and receive both a degree and diploma at the end of their program. It was at that moment that my future seemed to make sense and that while this may be an alternative path, it was the right one for me.

As soon as I was accepted into Western University and Fanshawe College's joint Media Theory and Production (MTP) program, I accepted my offer and the rest is history. This program has benefitted me in so many ways. I have friends from both schools, I get to experience the college and university life at the same time and I get to take on extra-curricular activities at both schools.

Although there are so many pros to being in a joint program, there are also a hefty amount of cons. For example, I live near Western, so I spend about an hour and a half on the bus everyday commuting to Fanshawe. I am also unable to use some of the health services offered at Western this year which aren't available at Fanshawe. I have to take six courses instead of the usual five, I am not able to do an academic exchange because of my strict program timeline and I am presented with similar stereotypes that I was in high school.

My program requires that I attend Western full-time during first year and often upper year students held events preparing us for our transition to Fanshawe in second year, but these were all very Western-biased. These students would make it seem that Fanshawe wasn't worth getting invested in and that Western will always be our “home school”. I even had a Western student reach out to me in September, telling me he had heard that it wasn't worth befriending people at Fanshawe because “Fanshawe kids are weird” and to just “get in and get out”.While I value the opinions and experiences of upper year MTP students who have gone through what we are currently going through, I strongly disagree with the mindset that was presented to me. Similar to high school, I was being forced to dedicate myself to the university lifestyle over the college lifestyle.

The truth is, I have made amazing friends and lifetime connections at this college. Fanshawe is just as much a home to me as Western is, if not more.

Although my program was cut for future students and is no longer offered to any incoming students, my advice to anyone entering a new environment is this: Keep your mind open, never go in with pre-existing assumptions and don't be afraid to befriend someone completely different than you. It's worth it.

I am and will forever be proud to be both a Mustang and a Falcon.

Editorial opinions or comments expressed in this online edition of Interrobang newspaper reflect the views of the writer and are not those of the Interrobang or the Fanshawe Student Union. The Interrobang is published weekly by the Fanshawe Student Union at 1001 Fanshawe College Blvd., P.O. Box 7005, London, Ontario, N5Y 5R6 and distributed through the Fanshawe College community. Letters to the editor are welcome. All letters are subject to editing and should be emailed. All letters must be accompanied by contact information. Letters can also be submitted online by clicking here.