Ryan Nelson: Students should embrace the college they’re in, not where they could be

I confirmed my intent to enroll in college on May 1, 2012, just like nearly every other prospective college student in the country.

And it wasn’t UCLA.

I had been wait listed by the this campus, and had opted to leave my hometown of Los Angeles for the University of San Francisco.

It wasn’t until almost a week after sending in my letter of intent that I received an email from UCLA telling me that I managed to weasel my way in. I now a had choice to make.

Turns out, I’m not alone. According the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA, of the approximately 76 percent freshman undergrads who are accepted to their first-choice school, only about 59 percent went, a staggering 17 point difference.

In the end, I became one of that 17 percent for a multitude of reasons, including money, academics, and, truthfully, maybe I wasn’t totally ready to leave Southern California yet.

So for those of you, like me, who originally had their sights set on another school but have found their way to UCLA, let me just say: You’re in for a blast.

For my first few weeks here, I was completely lost. I felt overwhelmed, dumb and distracted, repeatedly playing “what if” in my idealized San Francisco. I’d wondered what it would have been like to wake up to the view of the bay, instead of Hitch Suites.

Then, the strangest thing happened.

Once I stopped pushing everything away and finally immersed myself in my environment, it began to feel as if that wait list letter had served a higher purpose.

I started to think that coming to this school had shaped me in a permanent way. Essentially, I began to realize that whatever Ryan Nelson would have existed in San Francisco simply didn’t. Never did, never will.

And the only choice I had was to embrace this version of my life as it happened. UCLA wasn’t just any school, and I had to learn to appreciate that.

Alexis Williams, a second-year biology major, was another student in a similar situation.

She had originally planned to study law at the University of Oxford in England. However, law degrees don’t transfer, and she would have had to either commit to life as a lawyer in England or return to school in the United States. At 17, Alexis didn’t feel ready to start a life in a new country.

Unfortunately, her original insistence on studying abroad had left her domestic choices slim. At the end of it, UCLA was the best school left standing.

Despite constantly wondering what would have become of her overseas, Williams said she has come to find a home in Los Angeles. She’s joined a sorority, and even performed with them at UCLA’s talent competition, Spring Sing.

“The best part about this school is that anyone can be happy here. That’s something I’ve been happy to be apart of,” Williams said.

Yes, not going to your first-choice school is disappointing. When you’re having some rough moments your first year, you’ll grasp to that “what if” straw.

In the end though my story, and countless others here, is not one of “what if” but rather “what is.” The sooner you embrace the story unfolding before you, as opposed to the one behind you, the sooner you’ll find, it was all for the best.