How tough is tough?

Universities are tough on freshman students when all they know is high school level classes. Then adding majors, whether or not they want to work, commuting to school or living on campus, and whether or not they want to join a club makes it that much harder. At Mount Saint Mary’s University in Los Angeles, college students know hard work, and they know what it takes to make it to the top, but what happens if that’s all they know?

Mount Saint Mary’s, “The Mount” for short, is widely known for not only being an all-girls Catholic university but also for its rigorous nursing/pre-nursing program. Which means The Mount has their students working towards their degrees from the jumpstart comparing to other schools who try to ease their students into university.

“It’s a jump in cold water from high school and transitioning into college. You expect it to be hard but never this hard. But the work, in the end, is always worth it.” Says, first-year pre-nursing student, Celine Smith about taking core classes their first year.

With ‘The Mount’ being an all-girls school they do allow guys to attend the university with the exception that they are only majoring in nursing/pre-nursing. Which means if for any reason the male student doesn’t succeed he would need to transfer out of Mount Saint Mary’s and go to a different school.

“I have lost some friends after the first semester. It’s definitely really sad you met all these great people, and they are gone now.” Ian Sparano, a freshman pre-nursing student, says remembering his friends who have all gone to different schools starting the Spring of 2017.

This doesn’t stop the students from their dreams knowing that they can take an extra year to graduate if needed knowing that in the end ‘The Mount’ has tried it’s hardest in showing these students exactly what they would need to know in the nursing program. But, it does limit the male student bodies who might’ve spent a little over a year in the school making friends, getting to know the department they are majoring in, and the connection they have made to the school.