Getting excited about the holidays? Can’t say I blame you! But a friend recently reminded me that not everybody shares our enthusiasm. Not everyone has a big family or the means to travel to be with their family so loneliness may be more what they’re feeling. Or there may be money issues, health issues, sadness due to loss, but whatever the reason, there are many people for whom the holiday period represents real challenges.
Don’t mean to be a downer here, but those words did make me pause to think about students over the break. I, myself, am a self-declared maniac for the holiday season, and I use the holiday madness to escape from my every day challenges by getting lost in holiday shopping, planning, wrapping and cooking when I am not working. But it made me remember that for some students, that escape may actually be provided by their classes and their studies, so the holiday break may leave them without their perfect distraction, without their usual support network of campus activity.
Traditional aged students often experience personal change and growth in college, as we know, as they explore a new identity or philosophy. And the holiday vacation could provide an unwelcome opportunity to reveal that new identity under the scrutiny of old friends and family around the holiday dinner table. Many non-traditional students, as the majority of students are these days, may have so much going on in their personal lives that they get a break from everything when they are in class or meeting with a study group.
In my family, there were no traditional students. I was a first generation and the only college graduate till my Dad returned to school late in life. When my mom passed away rather unexpectedly, Dad was lost till he eventually went to college graduating in his 80’s from University of Rhode Island. Today I was thinking of how he felt that first holiday break after finally finding classes and friends, research and homework, all so fulfilling, to face the holiday break with a 3-4 week long gap in all that support.
As students come by your office in the next 10 days for whatever reason, and you wish them a happy holiday, it is good to remember that whether traditional or non-traditional, any student may be one of those people for whom the holidays are complicated, even stressful. Guess I am just asking for you to not assume that everyone’s ready for campus to close!