I’m 19(F) and I’m a freshman in college. I thought part of the college experience was making new friends and having fun (well whenever we have free time). The issue is that my class is really small and although I hang out with a few people during breaks, I don’t think we will get to be like an actual group of friends outside school, its already been 7 months and the only time we were out as group was when i invited them to my birthday party. My class has about 20-25 students and most of them don’t seem like they are down to talk to new people, they always wear headphones so i dont wanna be annoying trying to talk to them. Whenever I have classes the building is empty so talking to other people is difficult. I don’t know what to do. I know making a bunch of new friends is unrealistic and that it only happens in the movies. But my friends that moved to study in different towns or country seem to be living that “college” life and I wanna have that too. How can I find new friends in college?
35 comments
Sounds like you’re at the wrong college, honestly.
I understand your situation. If the college is out. Try making friends in clubs. Such as book club, chess club etc. It’s easier to make friends there.
I don’t know anything about your college, but some do offer come optional classes, usually foreign language or some more specific topics. Or try to find some group in the city linked to your interests.
When I started my studies I too didn’t managed to find any friends in my study field, but I found some good ones in optional “Polish for beginners” class and local choir.
So maybe this could be helpful
Go to clubs at your school, those people there are actually making an effort to socialize. Those people in your classes might be great friends but you’ll never know unless they reciprocate your effort. Don’t wait around for them but even after you make friends with others (because you will) still invite them, you never know what you could spur into action. Best of luck!
I got only one friend so I can’t help😞
Same with me , and all the time I feel I made a bad choice by coming here ……i just wanna pass 1 more year left , and get over this .
Have you tried any clubs or extracurricular activities.
Class is a good way to make friends but they’re there to fundamentally study and pass the class.
Clubs, joining a house or sports are way better for developing longer friendships that last outside the classroom cause it’s based on community via shared hobby
Many of the people studying there are older than you with houses and kids. That’s why they don’t want to talk to you.
Ah yes, the famous rose colored college life meets reality. That’s the harsh truth though, I think that the pandemic especially made people just a bit apathetic and not really thet interested in any kind of hangouts. I went through the same thing but eventually just learned to accept reality. It sucks but it is what it is.
Join clubs/activities that you are interested in! Best way to meet people! You don’t have to limit yourself to just the people you have class with.
To be clear this is everyone’s experience. You are used to Highschool where you knew everyone and already had a network of people. Now you have to build that again, obviously that takes time.
Go join a club or an org, I hardly made any friends in class but I made so many participating in clubs and my hobbies.
Rent an air b&b, but two kegs of beer, bring a stereo and some good speakers, ice and cups…..put Louie Louie on repeat….done
I’m in my second year of college and I still struggle with this, it’s tough out there.
Definitely join clubs, even if it’s a club dedicated to something you wouldn’t normally be interested in.
In my experience once you have one friend it’s easier to make more friends, you’ll meet friends of friends, once you start going to events with the same crowd of people you’ll get to see the same people again and again. I know it’s really hard but you can do it.
I’m at a small community college and I have friends but we don’t really socialize outside of campus and we only really hang out during class breaks.. it really saddens me that I’m in my final semester now and I don’t have that friend group I was hoping to make in college but I get it.. people are busy with their own lives, people are working difficult jobs, etc.. there is really no shortcuts to making friends, you need to simply talk to people and step out of your comfort zone a bit and the more you talk to people, the easier it gets to make friends
Start with one person that peaks your interest and makes you feel like you’d like them as a potential friend.
In my experience, people are naturally vain, and appealing to them by starting out with a compliment as an opener, “hey, I really love that outfit. You have a great sense of style.” And then you follow it up with a question, “can I ask where you got those killer boots from? Are they comfortable?”
Or if you’ve already learned something about someone in passing, like someone likes to do stuff outdoors.
“Hey, I heard you liked to go hiking and are really knowledgeable about the local trails. I’d like to try it out as a beginner but I’d feel more comfortable having someone experienced go with me. Would you be interested if we tried to organize a small group from the class to go one weekend when the weather’s ideal?”
I ended up leaving my first university after my freshman year and I went back home to live with my folks and go to a community college. I joined Delta Epsilon Chi (DEX) which is a business club (not a sorority!) where we had group bonding retreats and competitions in different categories with other schools. I made 1st in regionals and 3rd in nationals, best memories of my younger life (16-20 years ago).
Also, don’t be afraid to find a close group of new friends outside of school. When I was young we moved around all the time so I was constantly going to new schools with new kids. By the time I got to a new high school my sophomore year I actually ended up bonding more with the kids in the youth group from church in the next town over than I did with any of my class mates.
Wait until you get older. I’m 30 now and keep in touch with maybe 5 people and see one or two of them a couple times a month. It’s just life. You’ll make friends when you take up different hobbies when school is over. The reality is that it gets tougher to make and hold onto friendships the older you get.
I have work friends but they’re not buddies that I go have a beer with after work. I put my 8 in, try to have a good day at work and make time for others I don’t see too often when work is over.
It’s hard, but patience also goes a long way. Keep being you and making efforts and the right people will come into your life!
That sounds really unusual, I wonder if it’s due to Covid isolation messing people up. Or maybe it’s just a bunch of introverts. I’m extremely introverted and if it wasn’t for being adopted by a few extroverts in college I probably would not have talked to anybody or gone anywhere. Just by having a couple extroverted friends I had a full social life.
So maybe you’ll have to be the catalyst to get things popping with your class
You’re very likely at a tiny college. Maybe use the next year or two to work on yourself and focus on your studies, and then if you still feel like wanting that college experience (I’d recommend you look into a college in a larger city with somewhat of a party reputation) then get yourself a transfer
One thing I keep in mind is that I’m not gonna connect w everyone. The ones I connect w most become good friend candidates. The rest become acquaintances. Over time, the acquaintances sometimes grow into friendships. If you have even one friend, consider yourself fortunate. Some people have none.
The “College experience” mostly comes from dorm living. If you live off campus or your campus doesn’t have any dorms, you aren’t really going to form the camaraderie that builds when everyone is living next to each other in cramped spaces and you are forced to interact with other people your age all the time.
Hi op I feel exactly how you feel!
The school that I go to is very small and most of the time I feel that it is dead when to comes to “college life”. I would always feel left out and jealous when I see my high school batchmates enjoy their college life.
I’m an international student so most students hang out with ppl from the same country place and it’s hard sometimes to make friends and plan including me since they would always group up.
I joined an org and luckily the ppl there are really kind and they became my friend. We don’t really hang out outside but it’s nice that u can talk to them whenever you see them.
Idk if it helps but I also worked on campus and it helped me making friends with my student coworkers.
It’s a small start but yea
This is a hard lesson to fully understand in life… Stop going into things with expectations, most of the time life won’t meet those expectations (and sometimes that’s good, other times it sucks). The best thing you can do is just keep trying to make some friends, just be yourself and hopefully someone will vibe with you; but if not, that’s fine too because it’s better to have no friends than to have friends that you can’t truly be yourself around. It’s hard, and it’ll be lonely at times, but it’s going to be alright and this whole thing is going to make you learn how to be happy with yourself.
I moved across the country a little over a year ago to a place I’d never been and where I knew no one. I work from home so it’s not easy to meet new people, but I’ve learned to just live my life the way I want to and if other people wanna join me then that’s awesome (and if they don’t, that’s cool too, I’ve went my whole life without knowing them and I can go the rest of it without them).
People go to small colleges for a reason- to avoid talking to people. You should go to a bigger college.
Don’t give up. I struggled with this for the first two years of college. It wasn’t until my third year of college that I finally found a friend group I fit with perfectly and they’re still friends to this day. Before I met them, I basically never went out on weekends or did too much.
It was totally random too. I got assigned a roommate for the third year and we ended up clicking SO well. Then I met her friends and it just went up from there. While my school was not as small as yours, it was still pretty small.
Also just want to say that all the people I ended up becoming friends with were a year younger than me. You never know who you’ll find in the future
We are like 80 in my class and people are so closed off. Like they just talk to their group of friends and that’s it,so maybe it is not because your class is small idk. But yeah I am very disappointed as well 🙁
I never made friends in class, I made them in the dorms. If you can infiltrate an existing group of friends, maybe propose a weekend road trip to a nearby college that parties more?
Do you live in a dorm? Are there other colleges schools in your community? If so, do gathering spots exist in the town that attracts college kids?
Do you live in a dorm?
Do you play or have an interests in sports? Does your school have sports teams? If so, do you go to games?
Are you interested in activities around your major only, or do you also feel interested in activities, classes, groups, outside of that major.
For instance, if you are in engineering, are you open to theater groups. If so, does your school have a theater and serve to teach student actors about lighting, scenery creation, sound, production, etc?
How about interest groups in robotics, debate, public speaking? Are you interested in taking a class each semester not related to your major?
Do you have a part time job on campus where you meet other students routinely; maybe as a barista, or serving as a student rep on campus for prospective students, or working in the school library?
Do you have fraternities and sororities?
Campuses can have lots of noticed posted about upcoming concerts, exchange programs, ski trips. Does your campus have a student union where you can review postings?
To add a different sort of comment, I actually didn’t have a super great college experience. I went to community college first, where people were just focused on going to class and getting home, and when I did have friend groups, they didn’t last because most people were only there for 2 years. And then I transferred and had a bit of fun, but still felt like I missed out on the Freshman experience and everyone already had established friend groups. And Covid just made everything worse.
I was always so disappointed I’d missed the “college experience”, but I actually graduated last Spring, and since I started my new job and started living downtown, I’ve been having a great time! I’ve been going to a ton of cool events, exploring fun bars and restaurants, and I’ve been feeling a lot more confident! I just wanted to let you know that life doesn’t end once you graduate college and it’s kinda nice to know that your life doesn’t have to peak in college!
I don’t think it’s unrealistic to expect to make friendships in college. Other commenters have given great advice, but I’d urge you not to give up on your class just yet. It’s possible your class will never provide the friendships you’re hoping for, but maybe they just need the right push!
One thing you can try is “bothering” the people wearing headphones. Don’t do this often, just enough to see if they’re receptive. It might take a lot of mental effort on your part to break what you see as a social taboo, but most people will forgive minor transgressions, and from the sound of things, it’s not like you have anything to lose.
Also, try organizing more activities! You managed to invite them to a birthday party; consider inviting them out for a nice meal, or for a movie. Host a game night or watch party in your room. Maybe go bowling or something? Often, having something to do at a place will take pressure off the social element, which might be an issue for some people.
Finally, I’ll share my own experience. It took me about as long as it’s taken you to find my first group of significant friends in undergrad, mostly by getting an invitation to hang out at someone’s home and turning that into a regular thing. I didn’t really befriend anyone from my own program until my last year, after that initial group finally dissolved and I had no other choice, but when I did it was a really affirming experience. Later, in my graduate program, I was lucky enough to find myself in a cohort of friendly people, and enjoyed (maybe for the first time) a proper sense of community. Sometimes these things take years to come together, but that doesn’t mean they never will. Remain open and available and your time will come.
I recommend making a study group. Because then you study together, do homework together and let me tell you nothing builds friendship than commiserating over homework and projects together lol. This is exactly how I built friends in college because I lived off campus and clubs weren’t really good for finding close friends by the time I started going to them
Obviously scope out who you invite first, people you’ve been friendly with before etc (and people you would actually study with lol). This can be a good way if you have class at the time the clubs are. Even just starting with one other person for study sessions, that’s a good start. Not everyone will be receptive but hey, you tried and put yourself out there.
Once you know more people it will be easier too, as you meet people through other people
Are you in a dorm? Surprised there are no dorm activities. Worse comes to worst, this college may just not be your social vibe but you won’t know that till you try.
The college experience is massively overrated.
This may be why college students are picky about where they attend. I never understood it but this makes sense.
Honestly college is not what is set out to be. Everyone’s experience is different but everyone goes with the crazy expectation that it’s party, drinking, drugs, etc for everyone. It is like that for some but not most.
TBH, college friends are cliquey. Freshman year everyone is scrounging to find friends and grab the first ones they see. Most of these friendships die out quickly once you find friends you better connect with. Once groups are formed, most groups are very hard to became apart of unless they feel you offer something (getting into parties, drinking, etc) or you connect very well with someone within that group. My one regret in college is I found the first group I connected with and stuck with them. Even though they werent the best group for me. By the time I realized this, I tried finding other groups but struggled because everyone had their groups set.
My advice to you is, join as much clubs as you can that you find interesting and that dont take away from your studies. There are a bunch of people in your situation. You dont have to commit to that club, if you go to a few meetings and dont like it then try another club. Start making plans with people. If you say you hangout with your classmates for a short while during break, just say “hey im looking for things to try out. Do you guys want to hangout this weekend at XYZ?” Most freshman are looking for things to do, it’s a start and will help you create the connection to start getting invited to other things. When you make the plans make sure people follow through. Dont suggest it and never mention it. Get their number and text them about it. TBH, I’ve noticed when a plan is suggested everyone is eager to do it but when it comes time to follow through people dont really want to be the one coming forward.