Impact
of leaving home, making waves at CSULB
By Gina Ponce
On-line Forty-Niner
Leaving
home is an adjustment that most college
students must make at some point in their
lives. For some, independence comes sooner
than they are ready, and for others it cannot
come soon enough.
Clyde Crego, director of Counseling and
Psychological Services at Cal State Long
Beach, said leaving home is an issue whether
living in the dorms or an apartment. He
said it is normal to leave and have to adjust,
but not everyone goes through it smoothly.
“It’s one of those things people have to
go through,” Crego said.
Crego said students generally rebound from
adjusting reasonably quickly, but sometimes
it can take students up to a year. Many
times students handle the changes they go
through depending on their experiences prior
to graduation. He said parents may help
with adjustments by giving their children
more independence in safe ways earlier on
in life.
One of the biggest complaints that comes
into the counseling services is privacy,
Crego said. He said this is usually an issue
in group living situations and he hears
students complain that their suitemates
do not respect their boundaries.
Dayila Rodriguez, a family and consumer
sciences major and freshman resident of
the dorms, said she did not have to make
that big of an adjustment because she only
moved 20 minutes away from home. The
biggest change for her was not having her
own room and having a really clean roommate.
“It just helps to have older people around,”
Rodriguez said. “If I had lived in an off-campus
apartment I never would have met anyone.”
Her biggest complaint about the dorms is
the food.
Stan Olin, interim director of Housing and
Residential Life at CSULB, said freshmen
certainly have a big adjustment to make
and the staff in the housing department
anticipates those adjustments. Staff members
are trained to look for problems students
may have.
“We try to create a nice, safe living environment,”
Olin said. “We try to be available.”
He said specific counseling services are
not offered through the housing department
but students are often referred to the Counseling
and Psychological Services if they need
more help than the staff can provide.
When asked if students seem to adjust better
in an off-campus apartment than in the dorms,
Olin said, “It depends on the person. We
try to represent a lot of helpful things
in the dorms.”
Although, some students do not feel they
need the food, activities and extra security
that are provided in the dorms, he said.
According to Crego, students visit counselors
more at the middle of the semester during
midterms. He said they are not as busy at
the beginning of the fall semester because
people are coming back from summer and stress
has not come out yet.
Shawnae Brooks, a resident of Parkside at
CSULB, said she had a harder adjustment
because she moved six hours away from home.
“You can’t go home and get stuff,” she said.
Sharing a room is not an issue for Brooks
because she shared a room at home and her
roommate in the dorms is never there. Her
biggest complaint was that her room was
too small. She said she was homesick
the first week of school but agreed with
Rodriguez that knowing older students helps
the transition.
Crego said some tips that help to deal with
this period of adjustment that students
go through are to develop other social support
systems such as sport organizations, friends
and activities offered in the dorms. He
said sometimes it will take awhile to fully
adjust even with those things.
Crego’s biggest advice was, “Don’t abort
the experience too soon. You have to live
through it.”
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