Your choice of college dictates whether it is possible for you to live at home while studying for a degree – unless you are taking an online course, of course. However, if you do have the option of living at home, there are certainly a number of benefits to doing so, including financial implications and convenience.
Before you make your mind up, however, you should also consider the disadvantages to living at home when studying for a degree.
1) Lack of independence.
Moving away from home when going to college is often the first time that a student has been away from home. It can be a hard path to follow, but ultimately, it is character building and will help you to learn to live on your own two feet.
You will have to feed and clothe yourself, look after your finances and sort your problems out on your own. If you are able to go home at the end of the day for support from your family, you are not really gaining independence.
2) Lack of socialization.
Going to college isn’t just about studying. It is also about making new friends and socializing with people that you wouldn’t usually get to meet.
At college, you will have the opportunity to join clubs and societies and participate in many sports and hobbies.
If you live at home, you will still be able to participate, but you will find that you are around a lot less than your classmates.
If you are shy, you may find it hard to make friends at all if you don’t live with the other students.
3) Traveling time.
Unless you live right next door to the campus, the chances are that you will need to travel some distance to and from college.
This could eat into your time quite considerably and you may find yourself tempted not to go into college some days, either because the weather is poor or you want to save the travel money. Alternatively, you may end up crashing on the floor of your new friends’ rooms on a regular basis. Either way, it is not ideal.
4) Stress from family.
By the time you get to college age, your family probably expects you to start pulling your weight a lot more. You may be given a lot of chores or be expected to contribute towards your board.
Depending on your relationship with your family, you may find that they stifle and nag you, just when you want to have your independence.
If you don’t want to put your relationship with your family under stress, it may be worth moving away to college rather than staying at home.
5) Narrower horizons.
When you go away to college, you aren’t just studying for a degree, you are experiencing new things on a daily basis. You will get to know another part of the country, meet and possibly live with many people from different cultures and backgrounds and, in the process, you will be able to develop your character.
If you are still living in the area in which you grew up, you will find your experiences are narrower and you may be reluctant to move away from home in the future.
6) Less support from classmates.
Everybody needs support when they are at college. It could be academic support from professors, or moral support from friends and classmates who are going through the same experience.
You can still share your problems with people from college if you live at home, but you could well feel that you aren’t really part of their life in the same way that those who live in college are. You could feel quite lonely, for all you are living at home.
Ultimately, you need to make the choice about living at home when studying for a degree. Your personal situation will probably sway you one way or the other.