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For me, High School wasn't horrible in retrospect but I definitely don't feel that it was harder than college. If anything, I found it boring because it wasn't academically challenging enough.
As for Beat_the_Streak_MLB's above comment regarding leaving high school friends, I personally didn't have a problem with it. I was ready to move on. There were a small handful of people I did remain in contact with post-High School, but we all socially and geographically went in separate directions.
In going to university and meeting new people (as far as I know, there was only one other girl from my high school at the college I attended, and aside from exchange niceties we didn't 'hang out' at all) I felt as if I had the opportunity to grow more as a person. New people coming into your life, with different experiences and different outlooks, helps you to expand your world view. It gets you out of the 'comfort zone' you've created with your high school friends.
Getting into the work force then allows you to expand your social circle and outlook even more. By the time we were 22, the few people I was still in touch with from high school (myself included) had all moved to different corners of the globe. We all moved on with our lives and took vastly different directions- and I think we are all the better for it.
To be honest, I feel sorry for the people who are 10+ years out of high school and still hanging out with the same group of people, at the same places, live in the same neighborhood, and haven't broken out of that high school clique comfort zone. There's nothing wrong with socializing with friends you've known your entire life once in a while- but when they are your whole life, without any later influence or infiltration into your circle (such as college friends, work colleagues, etc) I believe it does become a problem.
Without meeting and befriending new people, your eyes metaphorically stay shut and you fail to mature from a social standpoint.
I think I had like 15 or 20 people from my graduating class move onto the same college, though only a few were actual close friends. It's just that each high school appears to have a specific type of person that goes there with their own little tweaks for each person. College just dumps all of those types together and hopes you'll all get along. There are WAY too many unintelligent people in college that are just allowed in for the money. And as a result, the curriculum gets watered down to appease them, because heaven forbid, someone gets a D because they never study, they might transfer to an easier college.
If college was actually what was written on the syllabus on the first day, I would have loved college. But as it turns out, we rarely accomplished even half of that. Plus, by the time you're done with high school, you've pretty much set your opinion on most things that are subjective that don't require specialized knowledge to have an opinion on. Why would I want to meet more people who feel differently? I still think they're wrong.
Then we get into working, the rigor of everyone's skills declines even further. I felt most accountable to my peers in high school. I don't find the same intensity or passion for people in the average person since. No one cares about anything. It's just "whatever is easiest or makes the most money." That's sickening. Yes, there are some people like me, but it's like I have to hunt everywhere to find a few. In high school, every person was like that.
The group of people you feel sorry for is what I wish everyone was like. Unfortunately, I could not be that person, though I wish I could. My graduating class is so talented that we are everywhere accomplishing great things. I was fortunate enough to do quite well near my hometown, but sadly not everyone could find a lucrative venture here.
Once you're done with high school, there's nothing left to mature socially in.
Yes, when you grow up and move away to college, you typically don't take your whole graduating class with you. Then when you graduate from college, you or some/most of your college friends will leave the area. You will start working and won't have your high school or college buddies in the office with you, most of the time. You'll get married and have kids, and you probably won't have too many members of your high school class raising their kids in the same town. I mean, if you do decide to live in your hometown then you might have a few, but probably fewer than you might think. People do move away for college, work, marriage, travel, just because they want to. It's just part of growing up.
Luckily, the world is small and you can keep in contact with people no matter where in the world they live. Out of my graduating class of 230, though, I keep in regular contact with exactly one of them. I have sporadic contact with others, of course, because we're Facebook friends, or because we would send Christmas cards with our children's photos and whatnot over the years. But out of my close-knit group of besties from high school, I talk to one approximately weekly, and the rest I just have vague information about them. I know their husbands' names, their kids' names and ages, what they do for work, what town they live in... and that's about it. I think it's like that for most adults once they have a mortgage, a spouse, a few kids and a career under their belts.
No, I understand that, but I mean the user I was referring to seemed GLAD to be getting rid of them all.
I wish I could have taken my whole graduating class with me. I know it wasn't possible, but I do wish it could be that way. That was the source of my confusion.
And I won't be married or have kids though. I don't think I could commit to a marriage in the way that a person should to feel good enough. I'm too busy with my career anyway.
I think I had like 15 or 20 people from my graduating class move onto the same college, though only a few were actual close friends. It's just that each high school appears to have a specific type of person that goes there with their own little tweaks for each person. College just dumps all of those types together and hopes you'll all get along. There are WAY too many unintelligent people in college that are just allowed in for the money. And as a result, the curriculum gets watered down to appease them, because heaven forbid, someone gets a D because they never study, they might transfer to an easier college.
If college was actually what was written on the syllabus on the first day, I would have loved college. But as it turns out, we rarely accomplished even half of that. Plus, by the time you're done with high school, you've pretty much set your opinion on most things that are subjective that don't require specialized knowledge to have an opinion on. Why would I want to meet more people who feel differently? I still think they're wrong.
Then we get into working, the rigor of everyone's skills declines even further. I felt most accountable to my peers in high school. I don't find the same intensity or passion for people in the average person since. No one cares about anything. It's just "whatever is easiest or makes the most money." That's sickening. Yes, there are some people like me, but it's like I have to hunt everywhere to find a few. In high school, every person was like that.
The group of people you feel sorry for is what I wish everyone was like. Unfortunately, I could not be that person, though I wish I could. My graduating class is so talented that we are everywhere accomplishing great things. I was fortunate enough to do quite well near my hometown, but sadly not everyone could find a lucrative venture here.
Once you're done with high school, there's nothing left to mature socially in.
One of my professors had no problem failing near the entire class (twice) because a few references were out of order. Surprisingly he was voted lecturer of the year three times in a row. Go figure.
Which would you say that you had the most fun in, learned the most etc.
College by far was the most fun and where I learned the most. Not that high school was, far from it, but comparatively speaking college was better.
why?
I grew up in a town of 45k people, with one high school, where by the time you were in high school pretty much everyone knew you or better yet all the groups had formed. So very little to no social mobility up or down or side to side even. On top of it I played 2 varsity sports all 4 years and my dad was an administrator at the school. Needless to say high school for me was a fish bowl.
I attended a college of over 20k people undergrad and grad students. I did not join a frat or any other social group. I went from being known by everyone to being completely irrelevant and i LOVED it!!!!
I enjoyed being an hour away from home and more or less being lost in a sea of people who couldn't care less who I was. I made several friends, 2 of which are still my best friends these 10 years later since we graduated from undergrad and I thoroughly enjoyed the collegiate style of learning and teaching. As a History major I enjoyed being allowed to exercise my talents as a researcher and writer and never met an assignment in undergrad i didn't enjoy (well except for gen ed classes my freshman year haha).
I've never understood why people WANT to leave the people they've known for the past 13 years, especially if those years were fun?
For me it was because I needed to see what else or who else was out there. Same reason after college I moved 10 hours away from home for work to a place where I had no relatives or friends waiting for me.
Looking back at it, I had some very good and loyal friends in high school. But i think that was only during high school as once we all went off to college we all kind of took the same path and branch out away from each other. I probably keep in touch with 1 or 2 of my friends from high school. I just got in touch with a girl who I graduated high school with who I hadn't seen in probably 12 years. She and I grew up a block from each other and went to school with each other k-12 then after graduation more or less totally lost track of each other.
I've probably kept in touch more with my high school friend's parents than I have with they themselves.
Life happens and for whatever reason friendships dissolve and new ones are born.
I'm saying why wouldn't you want to continue with them in college?
Like you are saying you prefer meeting all new people?
1.) very few of my friends and I went to the same college. we all had different aspirations of what we wanted to do or who we wanted to be.
2.) my hometown is a dying rust belt town where the chances of us finding employment was and is slim to none. the chances of us all living back home and raising families would've meant we all had to probably work service industry jobs making minimum wage. now we could have all forgone college for a life back home but again none of us had the ambition to work at the 7/11 for the next decade. with that being said there were several that chose that route. i know one group in high school who was very close and still is today and they all still live in my hometown and god bless each and everyone of them, but that liife wasn't for me and my friends. not because we felt were better than that lifestyle but because we wanted to see the places and things we had learned about in school. staying in rustbelt capital, usa and living in a 2 bed / 2 bath for next 60 years did not appeal to any of us.
Well School life was the best and funny but from learning point of view college life allows you a chance to get something learn. Well learning phase never ends and I am still learning and studying via online courses from UK Open College.
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Then when you graduate from college, you or some/most of your college friends will leave the area. You will start working and won't have your high school or college buddies in the office with you, most of the time. You'll get married and have kids, and you probably won't have too many members of your high school class raising their kids in the same town. I mean, if you do decide to live in your hometown then you might have a few, but probably fewer than you might think. People do move away for college, work, marriage, travel, just because they want to. It's just part of growing up. 
RE: Colleg or School
