Weather and College Culture

There is a blizzard coming tomorrow and I am very excited. There is just something about the first major snowfall of the year.

This also reminds me of three vastly different experiences I had at three colleges in three different parts of the country that were directly related to weather.

First, I started my college career in Northern MN (where I again reside, though in a different city). I never really noticed the snow falling and falling and falling in the winter until I got my first car my junior year. Then I realized just how hardy this school was- 18" of snow (and it's still falling!) and we are expected to still be in class on time. This usually meant knowing if it was going to storm the day before, making sure your shovel and boots were in the car, and getting up an hour earlier to dig your car out before class.

Then I transferred to a college in the Dallas, TX area. What a change! The area had a completely different attitude towards snow. My first winter there it snowed about 2" one night. I got up the following morning, hopped in the car and drove to class... only to find the campus completely dead! I thought maybe a few people chose to stay home (OK maybe I wasn't that observant back then) but when I walked to the building my first class of the day was in and found it locked I was shocked! It hadn't occurred to me to check to see if classes were cancelled- after all it's only 2" of snow! They ended up being cancelled for two days if my memory serves me correctly. I couldn't believe it- two days for a measly two inches of snow?!

I transferred again (note for any future college students reading this: don't imitate me. Transferring that many times= not smart and not fun) to the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. This school turned into the weather service place for all of the other schools in the Twin Cities, from what I could tell. The way to determine if classes were going to be cancelled was if the U of M was going to cancel. (Of course, with as many students as they have it takes very little short of a complete disaster to actually cancel classes). I was also working at another college at this time and I recall a few days anxiously watching the University of Minnesota website to see if they were going to close.

I was amazed at how three colleges treated the weather so differently. Looking back I probably would not have made the choice to go to TX if I had realized how much I would miss the snow once I got down there, but it was certainly a live and learn experience! When you're searching for colleges remember to ask about the weather in the area- and prepare yourself to cope with it!

Happy snow day!!