Trying to make new friends isn’t always easy, particularly when you are just starting college. These simple suggestions are easy to execute and will help you easily make new friends!
When you are in your room reading, doing homework, watching TV, or just chilling with friends, leave your dorm room door open to invite others to stop in and say hello! This is an extremely common practice and you will make way more friends than expected just by following this one simple task.
You can also walk down the hallway and pop in to introduce yourself t any other people with their dorm open. Let them know your room number and invite them to stop by to hang out sometime.
Eating in your colleges cafeteria offers the perfect environment in which to meet and make new friends! Pick a meal, (dinner is often the most frequented), and vow to sit with a new group every meal. You can do this every day for a week or two until you find a group you vibe with.
Alternatively, you can choose just one or two days a week to do this and continue throughout the entire year. This will ensure you are constantly building up a group of friends and will give you a friendly reputation around the campus. Since you often end up only interacting with those in your major or classes, the cafeteria is the best place to meet all sorts of students and break out of your normal bubble.
Joining a club, sport, or other extracurricular activity is one of the quickest ways to develop bonds and make new friends in college. Some colleges require you to be recruited or try out for sports teams, while others leave participation in the teams open to all students of the college. If you can join an official team, there are often tons of great benefits as well as a strong familial bond between the athletes.
There are also commonly student-created intramural teams who play for fun an often have more unique sports, such as ultimate frisbee. These groups are lower intensity and perfect for making some fun, energetic friends!
Every college is home to dozens, more commonly hundreds of clubs to choose from, so be sure to explore all the options! You don’t have to choose just one, but be leary of accidentally signing up for too many commitments.
Browse your colleges website for a listing of all their clubs or keep your eye out for advertisements depicting a Clubs and Organizations Fair. Most schools host one in the fall to give the leaders/presidents of each group a chance to show off what they are all about in a booth and allow you to introduce yourself. You will often be provided a ton of information about the groups and be given the opportunity to add your name and email to a contact list so that you can be alerted about future meetings.
If there is any activity you enjoy doing by yourself, consider inviting one or two new friends along to join you. It can be an intimate bonding moment and will help you learn more about each other’s likes, dislikes, and personality as a whole. This is perfect for anyone who enjoys practicing yoga, taking walks or hikes, sitting and reading, or even just anyone who wants someone to run errands with them!
This is by far one of the most efficient ways to make new friends in college since it kills two birds with one stone. Many people have a hard time pushing themselves to do their homework in a timely manner or simply need a little extra help understanding the course work.
Hosting a study group will help bring people together for a communal reason, but you can rest assured that all those hours together can quickly turn into giggles, mutual complaints about teachers, and great, long-lasting friendships!
Since everyone who walks through your dorm hall will be drawn towards looking at wall and door art, it is the perfect place to advertise yourself! Post a cute, handmade poster with your name, Instagram handle, and name on Facebook and Snapchat. As fellow students add you, reach out to say hello! You may find yourself having great conversations you never would have expected or even get invited to join some group activities.
At the very least, you can be sure that there will be a lot more friendly faces on campuses once you start to learn each other’s names. You can also put out a whiteboard or chalkboard where others can leave notes to you or you can make polls for your fellow roomies to vote on! Just be sure to leave something to write with out as well. For extra brownie points, hang a small dish of candy from your doorknob for passerby’s to grab.
College is a time to grow as a person and explore who you are as an individual. We are, in many ways, largely a product of our environment, so it can be quite easy to fall into the same routines and traps over and over again. As you are going about your journey to make new friends, keep in mind how others respond to your behavior.
You absolutely should stay true to yourself, there is no need to pretend to be someone you are not in order to impress others, that will only set you up with a group that you do not truly belong to. However, there is importance in listening to the indirect feedback the people around you give you. Learning what things people enjoy about you and what they dislike will help you to have an easier time steering your conversations in a mutually beneficial way.
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