Last summer I found myself staying exactly where I had spent my entire sophomore year — Chapel Hill.
I had made the decision after I realized I needed to fulfill an ECON 101 credit that I was simply not going to be able to pass during a regular school year, and after I accepted a job at The Daily Tar Heel as the Breaking Editor.
In the words of Drake, the voice of our generation, it was a time to be alive.
Being in Chapel Hill during the summer was a totally different experience than it is during the school year. The hustle and bustle of stressed-out students and locals mellows dramatically.
The downside of summer school was actually having to go to class every single day.
Nonetheless, I was only taking one class. After I filled my mind with economic theorems that my very humanitarian mind had a hard time grasping, I walked out the doors greeted by UNC's beautiful campus and would lay for hours on the quad with my friends, wasting time that I didn’t have during the normal school year.
Having a class and also working a part-time job got overwhelming at times. It was hard balancing traditional school work with the erratic time schedule of being a breaking editor. If you have a class requirement that you know you’re just not gonna do swell in, I would highly recommend taking it over the summer. Although it’s definitely more expensive, risking your GPA with one class that definitely doesn’t represent your academic intelligence isn't worth it.
Taking one or two summer classes also makes it easier to focus and digest all the information that you may not have time for during the school year.
On my days off from my part-time job and school, I could study my class content for a little bit in a very empty Davis Library, and then I was free to wander Chapel Hill and its ins-and-outs. I went to restaurants and holes-in-the-walls I “didn’t have time for” during the school year. I visited North Carolina’s many beaches and could actually enjoy my vacation time, rather than worrying about the four classes and part-time job I’d have waiting for me when I got back.
