How does Hostel Life Prepare Students for Real Life with Practical Skills?

INTRODUCTION

Every student goes through a plethora of emotions when they first leave their homes and enter a new phase of hostel life. We do miss the comfort of our house, the affection of our parents, and the familiarity of our hometown; but at the same time, we are excited to start a new journey in a new city with the new people we meet. The hostel experience teaches us a lot about ourselves and prepares us to face the world with a new perspective of being young adults. In this blog, we’d take you through a few skills that result in your personal growth through your life in a hostel :

Building our Personality

Acting Responsible

The first and foremost quality that we learn upon having to live our lives without our parents and siblings is ‘being responsible’. We learn to be cautious, we start taking care of our belongings and we pretty much are responsible for keeping ourselves fit and fine. With the hostel life experience, we become prepared to live alone, or away from home, coping with how to manage our own life.

Demonstrating Reliability and Independence

There is something more about hostel life- independence! We can make our own decisions and are free from constraints. But with the independence to make our own choices comes self-reliance; whatever we choose to do, is dependent on us; we are the main actors in this hostel life, hence, we should be careful about our decisions.

Enhancing our Communication Skills

The hostel hosts many such people who share the same story with us- people who have come to the city for a job or to get their degree. In this hostel life experience, we learn how to communicate with such a diverse yet similar company of people and get some fluency in expressing our thoughts and emotions with more confidence. We can discuss academic projects, or have a hearty laugh with friends; the range of the conversations will always loom large.

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Becoming Self-disciplined

Well, we don’t have our amazing moms and amazing dads making sure we eat on time and reach college on time living with us in the hostel, so then, becoming self-disciplined and organising our things properly for avoiding a chaos of not being able to find that one notebook or sock is one the advantageous things about hostel life.

Honing Interpersonal Skills

Appreciating Cultural Diversity

India’s cultural richness is so vast. In our own PG, UniLiv, we have residents from every state living in the premises and bringing with them an essence of their own culture. Roommates share stories of their own experiences in their respective hometowns and learn about the different ways households run all across India. We share food, we share costumes, and mutual love and respect and that is incredibly beautiful about hostel life.

Exchanging Knowledge and Expertise

In the hostels, students are pursuing different courses, also there are people working or interning; hence, it can be a great platform to collaborate on academic projects and acquire a lot of knowledge from co-residents. We can deliberate on various matters and have productive conversations. Hostel peers can also help us learn soft skills and hard skills.

Fostering Partnerships and Teamwork

Living in a hostel can boost our team player caliber. Of course, one can collaborate on multiple projects, even if it’s just making a DIY room décor with your roommate, working on a research paper with another hostel mate, or playing a team sport for a competition. We learn to share resources with our hostel mates and work on our team spirit.

Making our Social Circle Bigger

One of the best things about hostel life is that, it becomes a source of maintaining contacts and helps in establishing a bigger networking circle. With every senior we meet, and our peers, we wish to keep a connection which is beneficial for us; whenever career advice, personal opinion or expert solution is needed.

Sharpening Practical Skills

Learning Household Chores

In hostels, we are liable for keeping our space neat and tidy. Many of us get extremely busy with our schedules; sometimes we may miss lunch or dinner and have to cook for ourselves; or we may have to do our laundry and clean our desk from time to time. These are some simple household chores that we learn through the hostel life experience.

Managing Time Optimally

We are required to complete all our daily tasks in due time which includes so many things from chit-chatting with friends to completing the assignments; from eating properly to leaving for college punctually. In the hostel life experience, we adjust to this lifestyle and learn how to perfect a thorough designated routine that subsumes all our commitments.

Budgeting and Money Management

On becoming young adults, we are now provided with a monthly budget; money management is a big factor in the hostel. We should have fixed amounts for hangouts, grocery needs and have enough left for the daily commute and small nibbles in college. We also learn how to save for the more expensive things that we wish to buy later.

Problem-Solving and Flexibility

We could be in situations where we stand conflicted with another hostel mate or the warden, but what we require is good problem solving capability to overcome such issues. We need to accept that we cannot be correct all the time, we need to start seeing things from the other person’s POV and be adaptable to diverse settings while accommodating differing opinions.

CONCLUSION

“A hostel is not a place, it’s a state of mind- open, adventurous, and full of possibilities!”

As a hosteller myself, I can vouch for the fact that hostel life prepares students for real life with practical skills; I would also happily admit that it is one of the most dynamic experiences of your life that gives you a glimpse of what adulthood comprises. It makes you bolder, stronger, smarter and sharpens your personality. At this young age where we are just beginning to bloom, the hostel life experience gifts us with a lot of memories and skills that help us become better versions of ourselves, and that is just so exciting about hostel life and its fun filled culture.