A Timeline of Emotions During Senior Year

By Brittany Loeffler on March 25, 2017

It’s your senior year and finally, after three long years of schoolwork, clubs, group projects, and late night studying, you’re about to graduate with your first degree! It is an exciting time in your life, along with a ton of other emotions that will hit you throughout the year.

We’ve come up with a timeline of emotions you’ll feel during your senior year of college.

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Fall Semester

Welcome back to the campus you have called home for the last three years! You know this campus like the back of your hand. If a freshman asked you for a recommendation on where to get lunch, you could tell them to get the tacos on Tuesdays at the burrito stand, but make sure they’re served by Lynda because she gives you extra cheese.

You can’t walk around campus without saying hi to at least one person, no matter what time of day it is. Confident and cool, you’re excited to start the last chapter of your college experience. You get back together with your friends after a long summer of jobs and internships. Now that you’re back with your buddies, the real fun can begin!

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Sylly Week

The infamous Syllabus Week is your time to shine as a senior. You’ve saved your electives for your last two semesters, so you aren’t even worried about reading the syllabus. Senioritis is starting to kick in.

You go to parties and the bar to catch up with the crew and share stories from over the summer and make plans for this semester. Don’t worry, you’re not even thinking about what life is like after college at this point. Right now, you’re enjoying the bliss of going to class every day for a few hours.

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First Phase Freak Out

After getting off the phone with your friend, you learn that they have just accepted their first job at the corporate company they interned with last semester. When you hear their starting salary you get a little jealous; then comes the onset first phase freak out.

You haven’t heard from any of your past internships about a job offer. Why are people already getting job offers? It’s only November! Should you start putting out applications? You’re going to be homeless, jobless, and a failure. You’ll be stuck on the corner holding your many-thousands-of-dollars degree begging for a job.

But then you remember you still have time. Things can change drastically in a semester and there is nothing to worry about because you have potential and will get a job.

Winter Break

Winter break rolls around quicker than expected and you’re back home with your family for the holidays. They ask how your semester was and if you have any job prospects at the moment. You say no unless you’re one of the lucky ones, but keep your head up because remember, you still have time.

As you sit on the couch binge watching Netflix, a thought crosses your mind. This is the last time that you will have a month off from responsibilities with nothing to do during the day. You may never have the chance to be bored ever again! So you enjoy the time off and relax as much as possible.

Spring Semester

It’s your last first day of the semester! It’s hard to believe, but it’s the last time you will be going to new classes as an undergraduate student. When you wake up that morning, you get your bag together and eat your breakfast while trying to soak it all in so that you can look back on that day in five years.

Now you’re really top-dog at the school. Last semester senior, how did this happen? You catch up with the friends you didn’t see over winter break. You may find out that more of your friends have accepted job offers, which is great for them but terrifying to you.

Let the countdown to graduation begin.

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Second Phase Freak Out

You get your application to graduate and start going to networking events and career fairs hosted by your school. It’s becoming more and more real now. You just ordered your cap and gown (yes, this is happening) and you begin your second phase freak out. You start to feel bittersweet about college and the meal plans and going to class every day.

This may be the time you go home and scour the web for job postings and update your LinkedIn to look extremely professional and impressive.

Finals

These are the most important finals of your college career. If you don’t pass one of your classes, you will not graduate. You study for them like a biology double major. You pull all-nighters and order late night cookies so you can be sure that you will be walking at your graduation next week.

When you find out you passed your finals, it’s a weight lifted and now you don’t have to call your parents and tell them you’re staying at school for another semester.

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Graduation

You did it! The moment you have been working hard for the last four years is finally here: graduation. Dressed in your cap and gown, you’re ready to walk across that stage and receive your Bachelor’s Degree. Emotions, of course, are high. It may even feel surreal. Give yourself a pat on the back because graduating college is no small feat.

Enjoy your special day and your accomplishments with friends and family.

Getting a Job

Getting a call from the interviewer you sat across from a couple of weeks ago to offer you a job is the best feeling in the world! You feel validated, accomplished, and excited to begin this next chapter in your life. You don’t have to move back in with your parents and can start paying your own bills, because you’re a real person now, living in the real world, with a real job.

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Student Loans

With great freedom comes great responsibility, which means paying back those student loans you may have forgotten about while partying in college. Six months after graduation, those bills will start coming to your apartment. Don’t worry, though, with your new job you’ll be able to pay them off in the next 20 years, no problem.

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