Dear College Students,
Your college years are set in a political and social context far different from the one I experienced just a decade ago. Momentum was already building for Barack Obama’s candidacy by the time I matriculated, and during my sophomore year, I voted for him in my first election. I stayed up on election night to hear the results and then headed straight to the library to prepare for a 9 a.m. meteorology exam. Despite knowing that I had performed poorly on the test — non-social sciences were not my forté — I walked home smiling ear to ear because Barack Obama’s election symbolized that my own possibilities were limitless.
You are experiencing “the best years of your life” in the midst of a much more tumultuous time. While I left college optimistic about the direction of race relations in this country, the present is a scary and divisive time, regardless of your political disposition. News stories about deadly shootings, White nationalist rallies and threatening legislation fill your newsfeeds. Natural disasters and domestic terrorism replay on 24-hour coverage. For many of you, such catastrophes are not abstract and intangible. They have real repercussions for your physical, emotional and mental health.
College is romanticized as a time when you will have fun and have your ideas challenged. Despite campus efforts to raise awareness about mental health, for many, learning how to care for yourself and maintain balance are too often relegated to the backseat. The pressures of keeping up with schoolwork, employment and commitments to loved ones can be challenging and may be exacerbated during periods of turmoil like the one in which we are currently situated.
However, it is OK to feel overwhelmed. It is OK to need a break. It is OK to reach out for help.
I learned this lesson the hard way, soon after I finished college and was enrolled in a graduate program. My naïveté was shattered when Trayvon Martin’s killing hit the news. Shock led to anger. I thought in circles trying to reconcile the consequences of his Blackness and Obama’s Blackness with my own. Disillusionment with my idealistic worldview led to a consuming impulse toward activism.
