Posts Tagged ‘college life’

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Chapter 1: Welcome to College

Tuesday, September 26th, 2023

Chapter 1

(The view from my freshman-year dorm) 

“Should I wear this top with jeans or overalls, Mom?” It seemed like the most important question in the world at the time. You would think I was meeting the President of the United States when, in actuality, I was attending my college orientation. I was a bundle of nerves. Questions like: how will I make friends? How do I start a conversation? What if my classes are difficult? They all circled endlessly around my mind. It was likely evident that I was a mess inside, but I kept a smile on my face so as not to burden my parents with my anxiety. 

The start of college was an abundance of many things, like stress and anxiety, but also excitement and new experiences. Moving from Boston to NYC was not a drastic change but nonetheless a change. My school was now 4 hours away instead of 30 minutes. My bed was a cramped twin XL instead of the comforting full I had at home. Long were the days of solitude in my room, as my room was now occupied by two other people, not just people, total strangers. I was prepared for this. I was informed what college was like, and while each person’s experience is completely different, some experiences do align. 

As the days went on, my feelings toward college were nonetheless changing, and rapidly at that. Some days, I woke up and found myself excited for the day, whether due to a new conversation I had or a rewarding grade; other days, it felt like torture. I felt so lost and alone, and while I expected it to take time to make friends, at this point, it felt futile to even try to make conversation. I would walk the hallways lined with classmates who all seemed to always have a smile cracked on their faces or a laugh exploding from their mouths. Where was mine?

At the start, I relied on my roommates to be my friends… this did not pan out well. They seemed to take a liking to each other rather than including me. On top of this, I found myself in classes that were not engaging, whether it was my Intro Italian or my advanced-level Anthropology. I never found myself totally understanding or immersed in the topics; nerves made me apprehensive to attend class (nonetheless, I would still go). 

The weeks passed by, and I found myself in this limbo, neither good nor bad, just manageable. More and more, I talked with one of my roommates, Stacy. She was cool and fun and had never tried Indian food before. One night, with my Paneer Tikka Masala, I offered her a plate, a peace offering of sorts, and from there, we started to hang out more. We would go out to get lunch sometimes or walk Lincoln Square. Stacy turned from (in complete honesty) someone I disliked into a friend, and not only that, one of my best friends. A friend I would spend every waking moment with. We started sharing laughs, creating little inside jokes; all the little things were coming together. 

Soon enough, the girl I sat next to in Anthropology, whose makeup never failed to captivate me, and I started talking more. Her name, as I came to find out, was Jenna. A girl I had seen through the halls of my dorm but never had the courage to make conversation with. I can say now that she, too, stands as one of my closest friends. 

College became less daunting, classes lightened, and I had people I felt seen around. These companionships and experiences are ones that I know will last through the ages. 

 Key points:

  • I greatly struggled to find my place in college at first; friends were difficult to find, and I felt super overwhelmed
  • As time passed and tears were shed, I discovered a growing appreciation for my classes and connected with individuals with whom conversations flowed naturally, rather than trying to force connections.
  • Cultivating hope and patience enabled me to forge enduring friendships and make significant strides in my academic journey.

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By Juliana Capasso

Juliana Capasso is a junior at Boston University studying Film and Television & Public Relations. Outside of her academic responsibilities, she spends her time exploring the city with friends, reading, listening to music, and journaling. 

 For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering student discounts in NYC,  from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services.  

At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful ebooks, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2023.

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Chapter 2: Hi, I’m Mia! Please Be My Friend!

Monday, September 25th, 2023

Once I had officially decided to go to Pace University, the next step was to find friends and someone I feel comfortable to live with. Pace has a designated building where freshmen live, so I couldn’t live with my friend since they were two years older. Even if I could, though, I didn’t want to. I knew that if I chose to live with someone I already knew, I would be too scared to branch out on my own and I wanted the independence of finding my own friend.

Part of my Facebook post from the Pace Facebook group for incoming freshman

So for the first time in several months (maybe even years), I opened up Facebook and edited my profile before searching for Pace University Facebook groups. The groups are student-made as a way to find fellow incoming classmates and potential roommates. I found two groups, joined both, and began adding almost everyone I thought wasn’t intimidating on Snapchat. Honestly, it felt like a dating app. Sometimes I would hit it off with people, and other times we would say hi and then instantly stop talking.

By June I was getting nervous, because the deadline for finding a roommate was coming up and I still hadn’t really clicked with anyone. It was also important I felt comfortable in my own room and because it was 2020, I wanted to make sure I was living with someone who respected COVID guidelines.

Me and Kathy after we both moved in

A few days into June I received a DM (direct message) from someone on Instagram. At first I was confused as to who this person was, but then I realized they found me from the Pace Facebook group, so I responded to her message. Instantly we clicked. We had all the same interests, were both nervous but willing to meet new people on campus, and were careful with COVID. Kathy (her name) and I ended up chatting everyday and eventually found the rest of our suitemates (the freshmen building had suites instead of just a classic two person or three person dorm).

With my suitemates and I texting each other every day, the idea of going to college seemed less intimidating now that I had more than just one friend. I was beginning to get excited as we all texted each other about what one person was packing, what movies we would watch on movie nights, and what clubs we were all interested in.

Me and a couple of my suitemates

If you’re an incoming freshman, I strongly recommend searching for any type of online group to meet new people. Having some form of established relationships will definitely help ease the anxiety of moving away from home. Even if you eventually find new friends or fall out with the old ones, you will always still have that bond with your freshman roommates. Nothing can take away that old nostalgic feeling of moving in for the first time and taking your first steps into the real world with these people. 

My suitemates and I would attend different events on campus, a lot of them virtual, some of them with social distancing, and together we all found friends. To this day, I’m still friends with my freshman year roommate and suitemate, and I’m forever grateful for them and the steps of courage we took together. We don’t live with each other anymore, but we still support each other and hang out together when we can.

However, I think my suitemates and I did have one unfair advantage that helped us grow close early on. Normal suitemates or roommates have a special bond because they are entering the real world together, but my suitemates and I actually didn’t get to take any steps outside because for two weeks we were all locked in our suite thanks to an increase in COVID cases. That’s right…in October, the entire freshman building got put into lockdown, forcing everyone to stay in their rooms for a whole two weeks.

To this day we still make jokes about how we were all trauma bonded because of this. We had to stay in our rooms, have crappy food delivered to our dorms, and watch movies almost every night to keep us from going insane. COVID may have made our freshman year difficult, but it also gave us a suitemate bond like no other.

I’d also like to mention the fact that, despite my suitemates and I helping each other out with meeting new people, my specific roommate Kathy was like a professional “friend maker.” Almost everyday she was introducing me to someone new. Thanks to Kathy, I met some of my best friends, one being my current roommate in my senior year!

My current roommate (middle), one of my best friends (on the right), and I on Halloween 2020. We all connected thanks to Kathy!

Another tip if you’re an introverted freshman like I was, make sure to meet someone who is very extroverted like Kathy is. This way, you’ll always be meeting someone new and each day will be exciting, and really that’s what every day of your freshman year should feel like. Even if you’re dealing with a global pandemic.

Summary:

  • Why Facebook groups are helpful before going to college
  • Go to events and clubs on campus! It’s the best way to meet friends!
  • Freshman year is all about excitement and meeting new people, don’t be afraid to try new things
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By Mia Ilie

Mia Ilie is a student at Pace University, graduating in May 2024 with a degree in Writing and Rhetoric and a focus on publishing. She grew up in Rockland, New York and is currently living in Westchester, New York where she attends school and works at a local bookstore. You can always find her with her nose in a book or screaming to Taylor Swift with her friends.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC,  from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services.  

At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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Please Handle With Care

Saturday, August 27th, 2022

Whenever we are shipping or traveling with something fragile, we always label it as such and make sure that the item is handled with the utmost care. Why do we so seldom treat ourselves with the same caution? Items are replaceable, but we—as I hope you know—are not.

I’ve covered a lot of different topics throughout my writing about the COVID-19 pandemic—from being sent home from college, to current events, to relationships, and everything else in between. Truthfully, I could probably write about all the other ways that this unprecedented era of human history intersected with our normal lives, but almost anything you can think of would lead you right back here to a discussion of mental health and self-care—perhaps the greatest lesson that COVID may have had to offer.

Image credit: Pine County, MN, Department of Health and Human Services

Mental health wasn’t really something that I thought deeply about until I got to college. When I look back on high school and think about a lot of my habits—burning the midnight oil to finish my homework, sacrificing sleep, and generally spreading myself too thin—I can’t help but cringe. We’re taught that this is what it means to “work hard,” but it comes at a pretty high cost, especially when you’re young. No one should have to feel like that is the way you need to operate, no matter what stage of life you’re at. You are not the work you do or the grades that you get; your worth is far beyond that, which is something I try to remind myself when I start to believe otherwise. 

I still find myself exhibiting many of these behaviors in college, and it wasn’t until this point in my life where I started to feel physiological responses to my stress or anxiety—heart beating too fast, thoughts racing out of control, worrying about everything. And most of the time, I was concerned more so with how it would affect me academically, not physically or mentally. Yikes.

The pandemic really changed my perspective on mental health, not only showing how important it is to prioritize all aspects of your health, but also pointing out how many of the things we accepted as normal before COVID were deeply flawed. For instance, growing up, it was always expected that you would go to school or to work even if you were not feeling well. If you had a cold, you had to stick it out. If you didn’t sleep well, were feeling overwhelmed, or were burnt out, you had to find a way to get through the day. But now that we have lived through the onset of a deadly, infectious disease, we realize just how ridiculous this kind of behavior is. At school, more and more professors in their syllabi are now encouraging us not to come to class if we feel any inkling of an illness to make sure that we don’t spread it around to others. There is no good reason to force ourselves into doing things when we are not at our best, a mindset we should have adopted long ago.

Now, a lot of my professors have also added mental health provisions to their syllabi, encouraging us to take a day off class if we are struggling mentally and can’t engage with the class. Our student government leaders are pushing to make missing class for mental health reasons count as excused absences. In 2021, a student organization that carries out the mission of the Bandana Project, a national mental health awareness and suicide prevention campaign, was formed on our campus, seeking to provide students with resources for and breaking the stigma around mental health—all it takes is a green bandana to show your support and willingness to engage in the campaign. All of these changes ensure that we never have to feel that our academic career takes precedence over our wellbeing. At the end of the day, we’re at college to learn, not to burn ourselves out.  

Image credit: The Bandana Project
Be sure to check out this amazing organization!

Over the last couple of years, a lot of different stressors in our lives have converged at once: the spread of COVID-19, long periods of isolation, our nation in turmoil, and the general uncertainty of everything, while still having to go to college either online or in person when it became safe again. We are still dealing with the long-term consequences of all of these things, and the pandemic still isn’t really over. But we are all human and we can only expect so much out of ourselves, so if COVID did one thing for us, it was to force us to slow down and reconfigure our thinking to gear ourselves toward what is really important: taking care of ourselves.

So, remember to listen to what your body or your mind is saying—you are the best person to judge your limits and realize what you need at any given moment. Do the things that you enjoy doing, make you happy, and help you to heal—read a book, do a face mask, chill out (just to name a few of my go-to strategies). Totally cliché, but life really is all about balance. It takes effort to unlearn all of the things ingrained into our brains, something that I have still been struggling with, but at the end of the day, just please handle yourself with care.

As I said with my previous chapter regarding relationships, it should not have taken a global pandemic just to learn that we have to take care of ourselves physically, mentally, and emotionally. But I suppose it is better late than never.

A great way to practice self-care is to treat yourself in the health and beauty sphere, so be sure to use this coupon at Trinity’s Touch for all your brow, lash, and skincare needs!

By: Katie Reed

Katie Reed is a senior at Villanova University studying English and Communication. She is in utter disbelief that she just admitted to being a senior. She loves to read, but has made barely a dent in the increasingly large pile of books on her bookshelf that she told herself she would read this summer. She hopes to enter a career in the editing and publishing industry.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC,  from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services. At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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“You’ve Got a Friend in Me” (As Long as You’re Vaccinated)

Monday, August 22nd, 2022

As you get older, you learn a lot about relationships, be they familial, platonic, romantic, professional, or anything in between. High school is where you think you hit your stride in this department, since you start to become more independent and have many more choices to make; you are both physically and metaphorically in the driver’s seat more than you have been in your whole life. Making friends is also super convenient, as most of the people you are close with live no more than ten miles from your house and you see them every day at school. Minimal effort required.

But then once you graduate and enter your twenties, you realize there’s a reason that sitcoms focus on this age group—it’s the time in your life where you’re constantly trying to find your way in the world and relate to the people around you. All of your friends and family (probably) don’t live around the corner anymore, so it’s on you to forge those new connections. College plays a big role in this growing process because never in your life will you have as much freedom, but also as much confusion, as you do in those four years.

Freshman year of college is a particularly unique time because it feels like all the different realms of your life are trying to collapse in on each other. You’re trying to keep in touch with your friends from high school, you’re trying to make sure your family doesn’t feel isolated, and all the while, you’re trying to make new friends in a completely new environment. Being from Massachusetts and going to school at Villanova, I felt far removed from everyone I had grown up with, which was both a little bit sad and exciting. On one hand, I was wishing that I had chosen a school closer to home so I could cling to that sense of familiarity, and on the other, I was happy to be somewhere that felt completely my own where I could push myself outside of my comfort zone. After the first semester, I was feeling good about the friends that I was making both inside and outside of my dorm, and I felt like I was finally starting to see this new place as my home.

One such friend: my roommate of four years who recently came to visit me in MA over the summer. Shout out to any fellow Pirate’s Cove mini-golf enthusiasts.

Then, you know, this cute little thing called COVID-19 came along, and it became a rather tumultuous time in our collective sitcom eras. Less laugh tracks, more laments.

I started to wonder what would happen to those relationships I had been cultivating those first two semesters—would they survive a global pandemic? When we came back to school (at that point—if we came back to school at all) how would things be different from the first time I saw my peers? And what would happen to the people I was friends with from my town, where even the ten-mile radius felt so far away during quarantine? Everything was so uncertain, and those first few months of the pandemic were some of the loneliest months of my life. Stuck in my house, not able to see extended family members, high school friends, or college friends. But maintaining relationships and keeping people who are important to you in your life takes effort, and this period of our lives was perhaps the greatest test of who you would remain close with and who you might unfortunately grow apart from.

The rules of relationships also seemed to be changing to align with the health crisis we were living through. I was always incredibly nervous about COVID, both contracting and spreading it, so I took every precaution seriously to minimize putting myself and my loved ones at risk. When the spread began to slow and we could start seeing people outside of quarantine, the most important thing for me was to make sure their boundaries were respected. Are they okay hanging out with no masks? Would they prefer to be outside where we could socially distance? Would it be easier to do something or go somewhere that required wearing masks so we wouldn’t even have to debate it? It was great when vaccines started rolling out and we were able to better protect ourselves, but these questions never really went away. Ironically, despite being very cautious, last winter I still got one of my best friends sick after texting her that “I only have a little bit of a stuffy nose, I definitely don’t think it’s COVID” before hanging out with her. Guess what it was!

The text message that did not age well.

Though I would never be upset or mad with someone who accidentally exposed me to COVID and got me sick, I still felt a lot of guilt over just the potential of getting anyone sick. My friend was very reassuring about the whole thing, so it helped to ease the burden of what I was feeling. 

Maintaining relationships during COVID was difficult to say the least, but it taught me a lot about how you should treat people. From my perspective, the two most important parts of a relationship of any kind are respect and trust. Many people had different comfort levels when it came to the pandemic, so it was necessary to respect when people maybe didn’t want to hang out or wanted to take an abundance of caution to make sure that everyone felt safe. We had to trust that those close to us were wearing their masks, not going to unnecessary “super-spreader” events, and were getting vaccinated when they could. And ultimately, when those around us were sick, we needed to be supportive of them and do our best to be there for them.

These are of course not lessons that are exclusive to a pandemic but have instead been strengthened by it. In fact, it should not have taken a pandemic for us to figure out that we need to be kind and considerate of others, but nonetheless, here we are. And after all of those precautions, the COVID scares within networks of people, and the months of general struggle, I’ve come to realize that what I look for the most in relationships is being around people who make me feel comfortable. I strive to be that person for others, and I would encourage you to do the same, as it will go a long way in building meaningful connections with people.

Hopefully Randy Newman would agree.

Nothing says friendship like paintball, so be sure to check out this coupon!

By: Katie Reed

Katie Reed is a senior at Villanova University studying English and Communication. She is in utter disbelief that she just admitted to being a senior. She loves to read, but has made barely a dent in the increasingly large pile of books on her bookshelf that she told herself she would read this summer. She hopes to enter a career in the editing and publishing industry.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC,  from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services. At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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Chapter 2: Keeping Parents in the Picture

Thursday, August 11th, 2022

After the last lamp is unloaded from the pile of Amazon boxes and set up in your room–with maybe a few choice words uttered along the way–, you follow your parents back outside to your family car. The trunk is still open from unloading all of your many (some would say too many) dorm necessities and decorations for your first year in college. With the momentous closing of the trunk, you exchange heartfelt goodbyes with your parents, filled with tight hugs, words of encouragement, and maybe even a tear or two for good measure. As the family car pulls away from your very first dorm building, you can’t help but take a deep breath and savor your newfound freedom. Your parents are (seemingly) out of your life for good, and you can’t help but feel a wave of excitement for all of the fun you’re going to have. No parents mean no rules, and no rules mean you can do whatever you want. It’s time to start a new adventure.

Except… that’s not really how it works. Your parents are not gone forever. In fact, they might even be coming back in four weeks for parent’s weekend. Maybe you have plans to see them over a fall break or Thanksgiving weekend. Regardless of how much you see them when your parents send you off to college, it doesn’t stop them from being your parents. For better or for worse, your parents play a significant role in shaping who you are as a person. On a strictly surface level, they feed you, clothe you, and give you shelter. Sometimes they are the ones driving you to and from school or registering you for different activities. They even impact your mannerisms, interests, and personality traits in ways you don’t even realize. Even though they won’t be present in your everyday life anymore, you can work to maintain a good relationship with them while in college. Using the following tips and tricks can help you to form a great bond with your parental guardians while still expressing your freedom in your time away from home.

My first and most important tip is to set a time to call your parents each week. While the average college student has frequent contact with their parents, remembering to do this can be valuable for anyone in college. I strongly recommend doing something like this for a multitude of reasons. It gives your parents an opportunity to know what’s going on in your life. If you have a positive relationship with your parents, it helps you catch up with each other. If you have a less than positive relationship with your parents, this can be an easy way to keep minimal contact with them. If you are a person who enjoys having structure and making plans to keep yourself accountable, regimented meetings such as these every week can even become benchmarks for organizing a schedule, or an exercise in debriefing your week out loud with people who care about you. Weekly phone calls were something that I struggled with at first because I felt completely sucked into my college experience, leaving no room to think about what was happening at home. This is largely because I go to a college that is close to where I live, so I was focused on completely separating my life at home from my life at college. I was afraid that my parents would try to act as if I had never gone to college and were going to expect me to be at home when I didn’t want to be. But by establishing firm boundaries between home and college, I was able to enjoy my time on campus while not feeling bad about coming home once in a while for special events. Now, going to my senior year, I often look forward to reconnecting with my parents. Instead of being a reminder of my home that I wanted to escape, they became an escape from some of my more chaotic times at college. 

One of the downsides to living on your own and away from your parents is that you lack them as a readily available resource. While adjusting to doing everything on your own can be difficult, it is okay to ask for help. Often, parents can become even more eager to help their children with whatever may be concerning them during this difficult transition to independent living at college. However, it can be tempting to abuse this and just ask your parents to do everything for you, like asking them to fill out certain forms when you don’t want to deal with them. This brings me to my next piece of advice, which is to ask your parents to teach you how to do things, not to have them do things for you. While Google can be your best friend for smaller tasks, you can use your parents as a resource for bigger tasks that require more explaining or experience to teach. Using your parents as a resource is important because it forces you to learn how to do the activity yourself instead of having to learn it on the fly when you’re living alone. College is all about learning, so what better time is there to learn life skills than in a safe environment where there are fewer consequences if something goes wrong? And if you’re someone who likes to talk with your parents, this can be another excuse to catch up or learn hilarious stories from when they were learning these life skills. 

In the same way that you don’t want to take advantage of your parents, you also want to make sure that your parents don’t take advantage of you and try to dictate your college experience. It’s no secret that parents today are more involved in their child’s life than ever before. While the ever-inflating price of a college degree may be perceived as a good reason for that, some parents use that as an excuse to control every aspect of their child’s life, from the classes they can take to the places that they can live. This can lead to students going through multiple years of college studying subjects they have no interest in or missing a social life they desperately need. While I acknowledge that every situation is different and that it can be difficult to go against your parent’s requests, I strongly recommend that you work as hard as you can to have a college and independent living experience that is good for you, not one that is strictly good for your parents. One helpful tactic when discussing with your parents about these issues is to not ask what they want but to ask what they are trying to accomplish. Here’s an example: a year ago, my parents asked me for the password to my log in to my portal account in college. I didn’t feel comfortable with my parents being able to go into my account at all times, so I asked them why they wanted access to the account. I learned that they wanted to know my grades at the end of each semester. We were able to come to an agreement that I could find a time to show them my grades each semester, instead of them going in to check themselves. While this won’t work all the time, addressing the root of the issue can help both parties come together towards a better solution. 

At the end of the day, every family is different, and your relationship with your parents is unique to you. Maybe you love to talk to them every day, or maybe you prefer learning how to do things by yourself. Nevertheless, I hope one or more of these tips can be useful to you. If you learn anything from this, it’s that a relationship with your parents is not only worth maintaining but can be invaluable for a great college experience. By the time I was getting ready to start my first semester, I, like many other college students, was basically starting to get sick of my parents. Everything they did and said annoyed me, and I felt like I had to get away from them at all costs. But by the end of the first year, I felt like my relationship with my parents was stronger than ever before. As long as you put in a little effort, happy parents can help you go a long way in both college and beyond.

Speaking of adults and responsibilities, setting dentist appointments are one in the large list of things that you’re going to have to figure out how to manage and afford for yourself. Luckily, Ultimate Dental of Cambridge has your back. You can get up 20% off an appointment with this coupon and a student ID.

By: Lucas Pratt

Lucas Pratt is a senior at Boston College studying Philosophy, English, and Chinese. He enjoys games of all kinds, Dungeons and Dragons, and getting around to finishing the copy of Dune that’s been sitting on his nightstand for months on end. Lucas has decided that the words “employable majors” don’t mean anything to him, and is eagerly seeing where the world takes him in the future.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC, from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet✎  and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services. At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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Love and Other Problems: Apathy Stretches its Jaws

Wednesday, August 3rd, 2022

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Apathy Stretches its Jaws

Starting Freshman year was both exhilarating and dizzying. Exhilarating in its freedom, in its increasingly clear skies and possibilities and opportunities; dizzying in its increasingly clear skies and possibilities and opportunities. What now? Thinking of the what now always sent a nauseating rush through my ribcage, bitter nausea and fear down my legs. The lack of being told what to do or who to talk to with expected, appropriate social niceties was more disorienting than I had ever anticipated.

So began my time sitting alone in cafeterias, dining halls and watching other people talk to each other instead. It was a really pathetic start, being honest. The people I had been grouped with during orientation didn’t stick around for too long and I never got to know them too well, so my routine when classes started, was just to come onto the campus, catch breakfast, finish assignments if there were any––or walk around like a fool if there wasn’t––, attend classes, do the work I had been assigned for the day, have dinner, go home. A tired, dull routine.

having breakfast alone in the first week of university :’

On our popular university Facebook forum, there seemed to be groups of people who shared my feelings, this abyssal loneliness, but strangely I never met people like this outside of that specific online sphere. Classes were a touch-and-go gameplay, a small ‘hi’ and then formal interactions. It was infuriating and it made me miss school, and that longing was not an emotion I had prepared, like watching the door in anticipation for someone particular to walk in, only to see a stranger. I missed my old friends and I missed the simplicity of getting to know people, I missed talking to people at all in fact.

If I recall my first semester now, the image I can produce clearly was sitting at a table for two in the cafe outside the library, cold air brushing my cheeks as I type quickly on my open laptop working for my chinese language class. I paused occasionally, eyes flitting from one corner to another, seeing other freshmen talking familiarly, always together, always in clusters. Those who did sit alone seemed to always have someone come up to them randomly to say hi. I just watched, my hand around the cold condensation on my cup of iced coffee. I guess there was a brownie next to it sometimes, but that was as interesting as it got. Thinking back now, the most interaction I had then was probably with the barista who worked at the cafe. Glenda, I remember her name. She called me Yiru, which was my chinese name, and the only part of the torturous routine I dug myself into that I looked forward to.

Evenings felt worse, I could see kids getting into cabs together to go around the city and wondered how I could make a friend that would do that with me too. I went for a walk around campus usually at that time, befriended the cats around the buildings enough that they started recognising me when I approached. It was a bit peaceful and a bit introspective, and I won’t be unthankful for it, but it got lonely. Miserable. Maybe I found interaction difficult purely around the fact I didn’t have to make this much effort in high school. People came into class, we talked regularly and became friends. I had assumed I could do the same class this time too, but at that point classes had been online for nearly two months, so I was just joining a zoom meeting and leaving again. When classes turned in person again, I think my time became easier, but these people had their own friends and lives of their own so it never felt like they wanted to stick around for longer than they should.

food i grabbed with friends on an island at NYU abu dhabi

I sat outside, on the rooftop of our academic buildings, maybe with a cat next to me occasionally, and looked up at the blank sky, stars drowned out with the light pollution of the city. It felt like walking through an isolated forest. The trees there would be tall and old I’d imagine. Sunlight flickers through them, sharp and hot. There is a word for it. Komorebi. I would hear the sounds of squirrels, birds. There is humming, chirping. Wings with their dense flapping. The sound of twigs snapping and creaky wood. Birds are fortunate, you must know. They have each other, mindless in their friendship, mindless in their sounds.

This first month felt like a failure, I remember. I wasn’t living how I thought I would be, I wasn’t doing as much as I thought I would be. How could I think of love when I struggled to meet anyone to make into a friend? Seeing others do more, meet more people made me feel like I was doing something wrong, there was something I was missing. The gnawing fear of missing out on key experiences grew into a pit. I wasn’t even an introverted person, I loved talking to people and getting to know them, so this struggle was even more baffling. But it did change––mid-semester was when my life started to pick up, and when I started looking forward to my days going to classes, but the first half of quietness and wistfulness always stuck with me.

Grab some spicy Indian cuisine at Mughali restaurant! I promise it’s good, food here has been great to eat, even better with people! Take this coupon with you and get 50% OFF from 11am-3pm, and 15% off for dinner!! I can recommend their Chicken Tikka!

By Mahrukh Shaikh

Mahrukh Shaikh is a student at New York University studying Business and Finance with a Marketing concentration. She has been writing and creating literature for years and is fond of various artistic mediums and social issues.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC, from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services. At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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Harmony: Gigs, Glory, and Growth

Monday, August 1st, 2022

Walking home on the last day of junior year classes, a chilly late-May day, I received an email notification with the subject line “oh and another thing:” from my creative writing professor. I stopped in my tracks to open the message, which read, “surround yourself with friends who will never let you forget that you are an artist.” 

I smiled, remembering the conversation that we had just wrapped up in our last class, which she had reserved as an “Ask Me Anything” session. Her email was an addendum to the response she had given for my question about how to manage burnout in a creative career. She shared advice about maintaining artistic momentum, and even told us that her students actually inspire her. 

As I continued my walk home, I reflected on the class, which had ended up being one of my favorites during my time at Northwestern. Beyond my talented classmates, the interesting topics, and hard work I put into the assignments, it was really the professor that made the class stand out. I had never met a professor so invested in her students and openly emotional with her words of support. Through office hour meetings where we discussed a lengthy short story piece I was working on, I became inspired by her creatively-driven career path as a novelist and creative writing professor. She encouraged us to take risks and dive deep into our writing, and as a result it was in this class that I discovered my voice as a writer and an artist. I dove into my writing, embracing the work that I really loved to do, and the effect rippled out into my other passion as I began to pursue DJing more seriously.

The summer after my sophomore year, I DJed every week during my late-night radio shows. Once I overcame the initial technical difficulties and got the hang of the equipment, my time at the radio station became sacred to me. I loved being able to practice alone while also knowing that there was a small audience of listeners somewhere out there. All by myself in the studio, it was easy to forget about the people tuning in to my show, but one night, to my delight, I received a call on the radio phone line in the middle of my set. A listener let me know how much they enjoyed my set, and asked about the names of the last couple of songs I had played. 

As I gained confidence behind the DJ booth at the station, I began to invite a couple of friends to come hang out at the station during my set. Some would talk and browse the station as I played, while others would peer over my shoulder and dance. When the fall semester of junior year started up, I received an email one day announcing a party hosted by the radio station and asking if anyone was interested in DJing. I responded to the email, and by the end of the day I had a forty-five minute time slot lined up for that coming weekend. 

A picture from my first time DJing at a party

In the days leading up to the party, nerves were running high and I wasn’t quite sure how to prepare. At the radio station, I would just show up and try things out for an hour, but for a roomful of people I wanted to be more prepared. I listened to a bunch of music and meticulously picked out songs for my set, then I went over to my friend’s house to practice mixing with his DJ board. On the day of, just an hour before the party started, I decided that I hated my whole set and redid all of my song selections. I felt underprepared and had no idea what was going to happen, but there was nothing left to do except go and try my best. So, I put on my favorite outfit and headed over to the party. I was the first person slated to perform, so as people started to trickle in, I put on the first song and began to adjust the settings to my liking. As I made my first song transition, muscle memory kicked in, and I realized that all those hours at the radio station paid off, and I knew exactly what to do – in fact, I could do it almost without thinking! 

All of a sudden, the dance floor was full. I could see how the crowd responded to the music and tried to play off of their energy, layering upbeat songs to get the crowd moving with slower songs to give people a breather. I was nervous that my disco house tracks wouldn’t land because they’re not the typical Top 40 hits you hear at a college party, but I was delighted to see that people were really dancing and enjoying themselves. I left the DJ booth feeling a huge sense of success, and received lots of compliments, thumbs up, and smiles from friends and strangers alike. As the next DJ took over, I slipped into the crowd with a smile that would linger for days to come, and danced the rest of the night away.

Fuel your passions with ramen and more using this 15% off coupon at KYURAMEN

By Lu Poteshman

Lu is a rising senior at Northwestern University, where she studies English Literature with a minor in Art, Theory and Practice. She is passionate about all things music and art, and loves to paint, draw, design things, write creatively, cook and explore in her free time. She is currently working towards her dreams of being a book editor by day and DJ by night.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC,  from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services.  

At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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hot potato but make it a metaphor for zoom university 

Tuesday, July 19th, 2022

Picture this: you’re playing Extreme Hot Potato for the first time. 

You’ve never played before. You don’t automatically know what makes it extreme- you just know that you signed up, so now you’re playing. You’re a little nervous, a little excited. You bounce on the balls of your feet; you put your hands up like a baseball star, ready to play. 

Suddenly there’s a flaming lump being launched at you. 

Your eyes widen in shock. It’s coming fast, but your brain is faster. 

As the potato, hurls towards you, you process a few things. The first is that this is the potato you are supposed to catch. It is literally on fire, blackened at this point. Definitely overcooked.

The second is anger, because no one told you the “extreme” part of the game would be literally catching something on fire. You would’ve said no, or worn a catcher’s glove, or waited to say yes until you knew how to approach such a weird, wild concept, or something. There were a dozen ways to have handled it but now, with no way to prepare, you’ll probably end up with a hell of a burn.

But you don’t have time to be angry and, as the air around you gets warmer, you brace yourself for the incoming pain, your hands rigid in front of you, and prepare to catch the fiery starch. 

It’s too late to turn back now.

orange lineart drawing of a potato on fire
That is one very hot potato!

Sometimes that’s life- a game of Extreme Hot Potato, with twists and turns you never saw coming. Adolescent life, especially, can be capricious in all the worst ways. There’s dozens of coming-of-age films and books that’ve been written with the sole purpose of reminding fully-grown taxpayers about just how hard it was, and teaching up-and-coming adults how hard it will likely be. Between trying to balance autonomy with still needing support, learning to take care of yourself, doing schoolwork, making friends, holding a job, financing your education, and classes all at once, sometimes it feels like there’s barely time to breathe. Then, worse than any flaming potatoes, 2020 threw in a global pandemic. 

When COVID-19 hit an ill-prepared United States, no one was ready for it. It destroyed peoples’ lives and health, wreaking havoc on the country’s most vulnerable and marginalized citizens. For the people who weren’t dying or struggling with a weakened immune system, it was incredibly isolating. 

While not nearly as tragic as the numerous deaths it caused, the pandemic intensified the difficulties of young adulthood. It was disruptive to the college experience, leaving numerous students without housing or resources they thought they would have. A struggle it caused- that I can speak to more accurately- is how lonely it was. Best friends went from being neighbors to only being able to talk from six feet away, if you were lucky enough to live nearby. I was recently talking to my friend about some of the stuff I’d gone through over the pandemic, which had been a wild ride and a half. I’d broken up with my ex, gone through a few different jobs, dated, and tried to make new friends. My friend, one of the closest people to me when I’d been living on campus, only knew the parts of my life I’d shared online. We lamented the distance quarantine had created, the way the intricacies of social connection had been lost to distance. Not being able to be around one another on campus prevented us from being able to support each other as closely. You can’t really lean on someone from states away.

We were a single case study. Research conducted for the Children and Youth Services Review found that the impact of COVID-19 made students in India more “likely to suffer from stress, anxiety, and depression” (“COVID-19 and its impact on…”)) in addition to negatively affecting their scholarly habits. In the United States, the Center for Collegiate Mental Health found that of 43,098 students who sought mental health counseling, 94% reported that at least one part of their life had been negatively impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic (“COVID-19 Impact on College Student Mental Health”). The most affected part of life for the students interviewed, at a resounding 72%, was their mental health; at a barely-lower percentage of 68% were their feelings of isolation. Considering the CCMH report only acknowledges the responses of students who had the resources to seek treatment, it’s safe to assume the pandemic left its mark on the vast majority of us; it changed the course of our college experience.

I haven’t touched on everything else- the difficulties of staying focused in Zoom University, or the way the pandemic prevented students from accessing the facilities or materials necessary to do their work, or the way not everyone had a place to go or a family they could be around safely when it came time to evacuate campuses. Without any need for elaboration, I think it’s clear that all of it, compounded, created a hostile learning environment in an already-tumultuous period of life.

Perhaps the best thing to come from the COVID-19 College Experience was resilience. As someone who stuck through Zoom University, I was able to get a place off-campus, in the same town as my friends from school, and have a semi-normal senior year. Things got better. Proximity allowed me to be closer to my chosen family, to have people around me that I could go to for support, and to have access to my college’s resources. I saw the world start to heal, starting with the little community of Lesley University. For some people, persistence took a different form. Whether it was a gap year or the realization that a traditional college education wasn’t the path for them, the pandemic encouraged people to branch out, finding creative solutions that fit their needs, growing like plants through cracks in the pavement. We all found a way to keep going.

orange lineart drawing of two folks having a talk on a park bench
Sometimes you need a good heart-to-heart with the friend you got separated from at the hands of a global pandemic.

Extreme Hot Potato burns, but you make it out alive.

tl;dr: the only way out is through.

You did it! You survived quarantine and made it all the way through college. You- and your chosen family, made up of a ragtag group of college pals- deserve a sweet treat. 

With your student IDs and the help of a Campus Clipper coupon, you can get just that at Pavement Coffeehouse- and all from the comfort of your own home! By using the promo code specified in the advertisement, you can get five dollars off of your first mobile order.

By Ness Curti

Ness Curti is a freshly-graduated illustrator from the Lesley College of Art and Design. A part-time bobarista and full-time New England adventurer, they hope to one day tell stories for a living, whether through art or words. They enjoy doodling, procrastinating, and saying hello to the dogs they pass on the sidewalk.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC,  from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services.  At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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Love and Other Problems: Fading Nostalgia

Monday, June 27th, 2022

previous next

Fading Nostalgia

After walking away from home to travel to an unfamiliar, towering city, I wanted to figure out what to do, what I wanted, what type of love I wanted. While I did try to brush old dust off my hands, put ‘figuring things out’ in a casket and let life take me wherever it wanted, I’ve realized that while I met someone new everyday, I never had a connection with someone that made us more than casual friends. My life became full of friends you see occasionally, friends you’d grab a coffee with but it would be too much to get serious, to vent about trivial things, to share your fears because, well, now everyone’s uncomfortable. These friends were like holding a lit firecracker between my teeth; fun, explosive, painful and with me for a minute. 

After watching another blank smile, another the-one-that-‘walked’-away, an age old story, the sound of cold footsteps becoming fainter and fainter was a rhythm I became all too familiar with. So I thought about the most intense form of love I could experience; romantic. I’d had three relationships in the past, three very different ideals and experiences, three different lessons learnt—and I came out of them with three different understandings of what type of love I wanted. 

The first was foolish and exciting. I never wanted to think about the relationship too seriously and never thought about why I didn’t want that—this love had fumbled somewhere, I didn’t know its purpose anymore and so it was an inevitable end. The second was a blazing meteor and maybe my karma for the nonchalant mess of the first—it was a crash-and-burn-and-run scene, a rehearsed speech and anger and pettiness, a gaslighting, nauseating mess; in hindsight it was for the best that it ended. The third was less intense and exciting than the others, it was healthy and good and pretty, it was comfortable, but we had no chemistry. The contrast between the previous excitement and current calm became boring and my words had lost their meaning somewhere between my heart and mouth. There was no point in lying to myself and forcing it, so I ended it. We did stay friends, but then I changed and he changed and we didn’t get along anymore. 

These feelings and experiences molded what I looked for in others — I knew more about myself as a person and what I wanted out of people, not just partners but also friends. Some of these attributes seemed obvious, but I apparently needed them slapped across my face to see clearly. Looking back at every lesson I’ve learnt and every moment that was spent learning loudly through tears or screaming or quietly through silences and overthinking (all silly things now and I skirt from recalling them too often before unpleasant memories can fully form, before they can bite) I comprehended a large reason as to why it was becoming so hard to grow close to someone in college: fear. I comprehended this through a fourth almost-relationship that I had. He was perfect, with a pretty eye-smile and was sweet and funny, but I was scared of timing and life (it didn’t seem like the right time, being so new to the city, but when I got that there was no ‘right time’, it was too late), so I rejected him and it was something I ended up regretting. Fear took this from me and gave in return a lot of mediocre could-have and would-haves. 

I made mistakes and I learnt, people made mistakes and I learnt too. Love in college was harder than I expected (where my expectation was borne from books and other fiction). I wanted the same things as these rose-tinted fantasies but it hasn’t been easy. I don’t have a storybook arc, I don’t face a challenge to come out ‘stronger’ or anything remotely similar, love and life in reality doesn’t like to be so straightforward.

out with my friends for our last new year together!

I did not think of these challenges when I started classes at NYU, and then I made the aforementioned mistake of just ‘watching, not trying’. I did like people, people I saw across the room, people who were in my classes, pretty, smart, gorgeous and fun people. I talked to them too, I got to know them superficially but that was it. I talked to them when I had an excuse, but that was also how I talked to any new friends I had made…and they all stayed like that: friends. This wasn’t a terrible life-ending situation to be in, but it got exhausting when everything seemed to be going well and then there was a halt, a stagnant sort of space where nothing became of our talking or closeness. Then we fell out of touch.

That was when I thought back to just a year ago, how all of my experiences had shaped who or what I wanted. There’s a lot of people who think everything that happened in high school was supposed to stay there, but I disagree. I liked who I was in high school because it shaped what I want today, and everything that I had experienced wasn’t as irrelevant as people made it out to be. In the excitement of moving from one stage of my life to another, it was really easy to forget what I had figured out from my time there, and easier even to claim a fresh start instead. That didn’t help me, it just set me back.

This comprehension came later though, a semester-into-my-freshman-year later. There was a lot I sat through in that first semester which made me think back to high school, and ultimately the contemplation shaped me into a person better prepared for the rest of the years I had left in university and even after. It made me learn how to tackle love and friendships in a way that would result in the outcome I wanted, an outcome that would leave me happier for it.

dinner with new friends in the city!

While attempting to talk to people there were a lot of restaurants I visited with different people, I used to visit Bareburger with a coupon that I found really helped override the costs that came with eating out so often! Take the opportunity and grab this coupon for Bareburger for a great lunch with your friends too!

By Mahrukh Shaikh

Mahrukh Shaikh is a student at New York University studying Business and Finance with a Marketing concentration. She has been writing and creating literature for years and is fond of various artistic mediums and social issues.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC, from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services. At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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new beginnings and piercings as self-love

Monday, June 27th, 2022

Every time someone asks about how I picked Lesley University, I have a tendency to joke that I was following my ex-girlfriend. 

On one hand: this isn’t entirely true- the school had plenty of what I was looking for, including both of the majors I wanted, a supportive and queer-friendly environment, and a campus stretching across Cambridge. On the other: I do think going into higher education knowing someone who was both my best friend (at the time) and very dear to me did a lot to boost my confidence. 

I had a built-in friend, a way to start off the first of four years with a sort of social safety net. I had someone to talk to about the hardships of starting the higher-education portion of adulthood and the anxiety of moving into a new place. I had someone to do homework with, late into the night on scratchy dorm room carpeting. I had someone to complain with about the occasionally-questionable dining hall food. I had someone, and that made the nervousness of being in a new place slowly, surely, ebb into the background. This didn’t stop either of us from making friends as we both found our places within our new community, but it got us through the first few months as we began to build up new relationships. 

Having someone around who already knew me, accepted me, and encouraged me to be myself also made it much easier to get comfortable in my own skin- both as a new college student and as a trans and queer person coming of age. Fortunately, my school had plenty of overlap between the two, with a plethora of my freshman class being in a similar literal and physical transition. We were all looking to make homes out of our bodies, and one of the most obvious ways to do that was to get a new piercing.

About a week or two into my college experience at Lesley University, my ex decided she wanted a septum ring. Eager to work towards my own accumulation of piercings and to mark the pivotal shift into freshman year on my body somehow, I decided I would tag along. So, on one fateful student-discount Tuesday, we headed down the red line into Central Square, popping into the Boston Lucky’s for walk-in appointments. After a half-hour of sitting on some really nice leather chairs and admiring the jewelry selection by the cash register, I was escorted into the piercing room. The process itself only lasted a few minutes. A gloved hand ran an alcohol wipe around the center of my nose; a needle and horseshoe-shaped piece of metal followed suit, threaded through the cartilage without much fanfare. 

Little freshman-year-Ness standing on the sidewalk, staring down the tattoo shop. Done in layered green lineart.
Little freshman-year-Ness standing on the sidewalk, staring down the tattoo shop.

An hour after our arrival, we walked out together with our matching piercings. The new hole in my nose was all I’d hoped it would be. It looked great. My parents, however, were not on the same page. 

They called later that night. “It was a waste of money,” my mom chastised. “I don’t even think I want to come visit you on parents’ weekend.” My dad echoed the sentiment, taking the time to text me that he hoped it would get torn out. They warmed up to it as soon as they realized it could be flipped up, but the rift it caused felt emblematic. 

While a little warning might’ve done wonders to prevent any familial unrest, I did what I did for me. I love my family, but part of paving my own path meant not conforming to their standards. Rather, I was setting my own. And it wasn’t just little 2018 Ness who decided to kick off their journey into higher education with a piercing. In a 2006 article from the JAMA Network, one Lester Mayers noted that 51% of university students surveyed had piercings, while 23% had tattoos; with the destigmatization among the workplace and accessibility of body modifications, the number has only gone up (Sequential Survey of Body Piercing..). In Hallie Long’s article from the DePaulia, she interviews freshly-tatted Angie Rainey, who declares that the tattoo she got in college “caught [her].. at such a transformative and new time in.. life” (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15193575/). The body is a temple, and so many people have taken it upon themselves to decorate theirs to reflect burgeoning personal style. By making the decision to kick off college with a piercing, I became one of many new students who made similar choices, a way of making their bodies feel more like a refuge among the turbulence of life. Even in periods of great change, the one thing we can control is ourselves. 

Self-expression through body mods is a fairly common, healthy mechanism for self-discovery.

Another article from the Journal of Adolescent Health deems the reasoning behind piercings to be an act of identity, rather than rebellion (Contemporary College Students and Body Piercing). Between myself and the people I knew, most of us who were modifying our bodies (whether through our piercings, tattoos, or haircuts) were doing so as a way to find a sense of community within an alternative subculture. It was a statement of self, seeking out community and building our own confidence rather than actively trying to disrupt a peace within our immediate families. It was just that now, we had the freedom to find this new place for ourselves.

I started my first year of college nervous. Nervous about my relationship, about school, about the friendships I had yet to find. I was nervous about my parents, about getting homesick, about whether or not we’d see eye-to-eye. I was worried about whether or not the new hole in my body would heal properly. But even in the wake of all the fears about the future, I knew I’d be okay.

And you know what?

I am.

Glow-up of the century.

tl;dr: be nervous if you must, but know you’ll be okay.

Sometimes making the perfect change to your look is the thing that makes you feel your best and most confident, and there’s nothing quite like a fresh cut to help you feel your best… dare I say, nothing feels quite as marvelous! 

For that life-changing, new-kid-on-campus chop, treat yourself to a place that really understands the power of looking and feeling your best, like Marvelous Barber Lounge. With the help of Campus Clipper, you can get 20% off on the ultimate grooming experience- just bring your student ID and your coupon to redeem!

By Ness Curti

Ness Curti is a freshly-graduated illustrator from the Lesley College of Art and Design. A part-time bobarista and full-time New England adventurer, they hope to one day tell stories for a living, whether through art or words. They enjoy doodling, procrastinating, and saying hello to the dogs they pass on the sidewalk.

For over 20 years, the Campus Clipper has been offering awesome student discounts in NYC,  from the East Side to Greenwich Village. Along with inspiration, the company offers students a special coupon booklet and the Official Student Guide, which encourages them to discover new places in the city and save money on food, clothing, and services.  At the Campus Clipper, not only do we help our interns learn new skills, make money, and create wonderful e-books, we give them a platform to teach others. Check our website for more student savings and watch our YouTube video showing off some of New York City’s finest students during the Welcome Week of 2015.

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