"What's the best way to ensure your first year at college is a success?" This is a question answered by Carol Carter, author of Majoring in the Rest of Your Life: Career Secrets for College Students (1999). In this interview with FOX News, Dallas, she says that the biggest shocker for college freshmen is "that they are accountable to themselves, no one is going to be there to help."
This is a fascinating look at freshmen in college and offers great tips for those who graduate and choose to further their education. Many freshmen have to deal with intercultural transitions and the identity development process. They have to learn to be competent. In our textbook, Intercultural Communication in Contexts, Martin and Nakayama asks "Do we have to be motivated to be good at intercultural communication?" (465). Intercultural communication competence utilizes individualism and also contextual. They look at context of motivation, defined, "as an individual component of intercultural communication competence, the desire to make a commitment in relationships, to learn about the self and others and to remain flexible" (465). It is important to become and then remain motivated. It will keep the student set on his or her goal of getting a college education. They may be uncomfortable with the idea of intercultural communication. They need to find their "communication comfort zone" which "often leads to insights into other individuals, groups, and cultures" (466).
Other key components of intercultural competence, according to Martin and Nakayama, are knowledge, attitudes, behaviors and skills. Knowledge, specifically self-knowledge, is "knowing how you may be perceived as a communicator and what your strengths and weaknesses are" (468). This is a great skill for college freshmen to have. Attitudes are "an individual's dispositions or mental sets. As a component of intercultural communication competence, attitudes include tolerance for ambiguity, empathy, and nonjudgmentalism" (469). This is another important skill, because all freshmen are the same. They are all on the same level of other freshmen and learning new things. It's important to remember this about others and it will increase good communication. Behaviors and skills are obviously going to help with communication with other students, professors and friends.
One can search youtube.com for many "tips for college freshmen" and other helpful videos. A student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln made her own video offering some helpful (and some silly) tips for college freshmen that she wishes she knew before her first year. This video won't load to this blog, but here is the link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jh9zmKaR6S8&feature=related
Thanks for reading my blog!
Martin, J. N., & Nakayama, T.K. (2010). Intercultural Communication in Contexts. Boston, MA:
McGraw-Hill
