Night Students Should Have The Same Opportunities As Regular Students

Being a night student certainly has its challenges.

To begin with, Miami Dade College seems to have more of its hustle and bustle at night, than during its day classes. I’ve often visited Wolfson Campus during the day and found it quite pleasant to find parking anywhere beneath the fifth floor.

It seems the influx of students enrolling or re-enrolling into college within the last two years alone, are composed mostly of night students. Your general night students usually consist of older, working professionals who have either full time jobs or families to take care of.

This does not, however, mean night students would not like the same opportunities that day students have extended to them. As a night student, I have faced a lot of challenges in trying to participate in many activities here at the College and often feel like a second class citizen.

I receive the emails and frequent the same homepage. However, I am often disappointed when the lectures I’m interested in attending occur in the morning or early afternoon instead of a later time. In fairness, the College does a great job of having many interesting speakers.

What they must not realize is that they tend to unintentionally exclude us, their “night students.” It is problematic for us that many of the activities are scheduled during the day time.

Want to join a club? Try finding one that will give you the opportunity to participate; most of them do not meet at night.

This has become incredibly frustrating.

Just because we go to school at night, does not mean we do not want the same “experience” as our daytime counterparts.

There have innumerable moments in which I have wanted to chime in on an interesting lecture or join in on an organization or activity only to be told it’s impossible due to schedule conflicts.

I believe students who are involved with their college have the most school pride and there is so much the night student body has to contribute to the college if it were given the chance. If only there there could be more clubs that met at night.

Maybe there can be an evening when all the organizations get together to recruit night students. I think people would find many of these students to be enthusiastic and willing to participate. They would feel as if they were “a part of something” and not just coming to class.

I know I am not the only student who feels this way. Lots of my other classmates feel the same way and some have just given up trying to get involved because of the lack of options and outreach.

As things have rapidly progressed in the last few years, I believe the College should consider reaching out to its evening students. They might be pleasantly surprised to find the vibrancy and enthusiasm that lies within these students.