The transition from high school to college would have been impossible for me without the love and support of the Disciples. First Christian Lynchburg welcomed me warmly on my first visit and offered a phenomenal support network. I received cards and Facebook messages welcoming me to Lynchburg. The church also provided a way for me to experience some true Virginia hospitality. The church invited Lynchburg's Disciples on Campus to accompany them on First Lynchburg's annual work weekend at Craig Springs in the western Virginia hills over Fall Break. The trip enabled me to establish new friendships. After all, nothing forges friendships quite as well as time spent together working in God's name.

First Christian's support was indeed heartwarming, but I would be doing you a disservice if I claimed that the transition from high school to college has been easy. Personal responsibility is a daunting task for someone who has always had a super-organized mother to rely on. I struggled with the release from high school. I slept through a couple 9 a.m. classes when I stayed up too late the previous night. I did not get the kind of GPA at the first midterm that I would have liked. But I learned an enormous amount of important information about myself in the first semester. I learned the costs of procrastination and the difficulties of having professors who no longer accepted "passable" work. College professors expect the best out of you. Yes, their class is the only class you have, and it is the student's job to make class work a priority. It is incredibly easy to fill time in college. One will have more time out of class, but that does not mean that one is not supposed to be studying. Do your work — before you want to. Above all, do not get stuck on a sentence when you are writing. Write first, edit later.

Every single one of those lessons stems from a different experience last semester, and some of them are much more difficult to type than practice. However, if there is any lesson that I would like you to take out of this article, it is the plea to always tuck your shirt in when you dive into snow.