College Pressures By William Zinsser Analysis

Hunger, A.J. SR “College Pressures”

Background

William Zinsser is a lifelong journalist and nonfiction writer. He also is on the faculty at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and the News School. He started his career on the New York Herald Tribune in 1946. He is the author of eighteen books ranging from commentary, to baseball, to memoir, to travel, to jazz, to American popular song, and to the craft of writing. He was the master of Branford College, where he used his own personal experience from his time there to write on this topic. Currently, he is still writing and teaching while living in New York (“William Zinsser - Writer”). What made him want to write all of these books on these various topics? What was his

The selection talks about how most kids who went to college in 1979 would graduate with some amount of debt that they would have to start repaying a year after college. This would add pressure onto the students because they would have to do well, and they would have to pick jobs that made them more money. Parental pressure caused kids to do what made their parents happy, and not what themselves happy. Peer pressure affected a lot of the students. It made them push themselves harder if they perceived that someone was working harder than them. Finally, self-induced pressure causes students to overachieve which adds stress onto them. These types of stress can have a profound effect on the college

In 1979, “…it is not unusual for a student, even if he works part time at college and full time during the summer, to accrue $5,000 in loans after four years—loans that he must start to repay within one year after graduation” (13). This is something that the student will carry in the back of their mind while they study. They will never be to sure of what they will have to do to pay it all back. This is something though that is tied closely to parental pressure. “The parents mean well; they are trying to steer their sons and authors toward a secure future. But the sons and daughters want to major in history or classics or philosophy—subjects with no ‘practical’ value” (20). This strains the students, and makes it harder for them to really enjoy going to class everyday. After that though there are two different types of pressure that the student themselves cause. The first type of stress is peer pressure. “I had a freshmen student I’ll call Linda, who came in and said she was under terrible pressure because her roommate, Barbara, was much brighter and studied all the time. I couldn’t tell her that Barbara had come in two hours earlier to say the same thing about Linda” (24). This competitiveness that students feel to push themselves harder is caused by the peer pressure. This will cause tons of unneeded stress that will have an affect on all the