Your Dorm/ Apartment
You lived, breathed, and ate school for the past four years. But mostly lived it – in a dorm! Your living space is uniquely styled to become an inanimate YOU! This is your personal style on a blank slate. Capture how you live right now, because the chances of you living like that again are slim to none (even if you plan on going to graduate school). I know right now it seems cramped and horrible. You’re probably saying, “you’re crazy. I’m pumped to get out of here!” But someday down the road, you’ll think back to the place you created all on your own. The place that was once a dull, white-walled prison, and you made it a comfortable home. You’ll think of the movie nights, microwave meals, the up-all-night finals weeks, times your friends held you as you cried, and overcoming fears. You’ll associate all of those memories with that little room you made home. And chances are, you’ll thank your lucky stars you have a few photos in it.
The Library or Coffee Shop you Frequent
If you rarely spend time in the place you sleep, you likely spend a taaad bit of time in a library or coffee shop on or near campus. And by tad bit, I mean you basically live there. Hours and hours are spent at study hot spots to prep for pop quizzes, midterms, and finals. Or even just to focus enough on the homework in front of you to actually get it done! Any which way you look at it, this degree that you’re about to accept was earned here. Maybe you took the exams in class or attended study halls, but all the knowledge you absorbed after classes you came out confused from and online courses you had to teach yourself were all accomplished and learned here. Truth is, YOU did it. And you did it HERE. So why not remember it, you little bookworm, you!
Your Performing or Practice Space
Whether it be the gym, the field, the court, performance hall, or the track, if you perform or play a sport, this space is one of the most sentimental places of your life (let alone your college career). Your highest highs and lowest lows were carried out in your practice and performing spaces and shaped you into you! You poured your blood, sweat, and tears into your college years. Throw on that uniform and show all that hard work to the camera! (and even ask your favorite teammates to join you too!)
A Classroom/Lecture Hall
The place that you absorbed all of the information that got you into that cap. A classroom to a brainiac can easily be the equivalent of a sports player to their practice space. This is where YOU shine, school-lovers and driven, early-graduates. You lived here for these classes and gave up your life before college to meet the field professionals for the career you wanted to be part of. After the heart-pumping exams and quizzes, you can consider this your performance space. After quite a few fantastic performances, you did it. You did it because you sat in that crowd in the lecture hall or at that desk in a classroom. Why not capture that?
The Place you Intern/Volunteer
College isn’t just homework and classwork. Oftentimes, it requires actual job force work too. *Huff*. Without pay. So. Much. Work has been put in to finally reach this amazing achievement. Almost too much to think you could finish. But here we are. Months to weeks from you actually receiving that diploma you’ve been working your butt off for… for years. This unpaid job is your square one. It’s your starting point to your dream job and it deserves documentation so that everyone who looks at it years down the road can say, “wow. That’s where they started.” Maybe it’ll even wow yourself.
The Dome/Football Field
This one’s for you sports fans and players! Your college years are infused with attending (or playing in) football games and events held at the hub of campus – the football field! Whether it be concerts, performances, routines, or just a great game, you and your friends screamed for your school from those bleachers. You chanted fight songs and cheered along with the cheerleaders. Whether the game ended with you hugging the people around you or cursing a foul play, nearly every time you left the field in a happy college daze. I want to capture that.
The University Sign
This one isn’t the most uncommon place, but so many people snap a photo here when they first begin their college career. Why not do the same thing at the end? Whether you’re at the same school you started at, it could be an amazing way to compare where you were/are in your life by snapping the same exact photo – except in a cap and gown this time! How couldn’t a before and after like that win grad announcement of the year?!
In a Campus Fountain!
I mean, in the midst of a quarantine or after hours when no one’s out, who says you can’t show your fun, adventurous side in these pictures?! Better yet, pop open some champagne in that pond. Splash around and have fun, party animal!
No matter what your college experience was like, it was yours and only yours. Nobody else experienced it the same way you did. You’ve spent four or more years setting yourself up for a successful future. This was no small feat, and it’s something everyone should have captured. So have the most fun with your pictures and happy graduating!