My 4-Year College Reflection!

I graduate from the University of Southern California in a few weeks with my Public Relations degree and this is my full 4-year college reflection from freshman year of college to senior year of college. We will be discussing all of the ups and downs including Parties, Internships, Relationships, Friends, Classes, Study Abroad, Career Plans and more!

Hey guys, it's Joi here, and today we are doing a full college reflection. I am graduating from college next month in May. The 15th was supposed to be my graduation day. But of course, due to staying inside and all that stuff, my graduation has been postponed. However, I thought it would be a great time to reflect on my college experience. From freshman to senior year, we're going to discuss all of the ups the downs, party, and boys.  I hope that you guys can take something away from this video. If you are in college, comment down below one of your best or worst experiences in college, so we can get the conversation going down below.


Other than that, subscribe to this channel, especially if you want to see my life after graduating. I will be doing a separate video on my post-grad plans. Make sure you subscribe so you can see that video as well. Let's get into my freshman year. So freshman year, I would say it was one of my better years of college, and I say this because I came into college so excited. USC was my dream school in high school, and I also got a full-tuition scholarship to attend. That was just such a huge blessing. My family just had to pay for my housing.

Freshman Year

So freshman year, I lived in the Honors dorm, which the dorm for all the students who get scholarships. I got to live with another black roommate. I met her while I was doing a college campus tour, and we decided to request each other as roommates. My freshman year friend group was my roommate and then two girls who live across the hall.  I'm not going to say anyone with names because I don't know if they want to be mentioned in the video. But they are like my core friend group. They were the only friends I kept throughout college that consider my real friends.


I'm very selective when it comes to friends because I prefer quality over quantity. So freshman year was one of my most academically challenging years, surprisingly. I had a full course load, both semesters, and I was just in general education courses. I came in as a journalism major. So I was taking journalism classes, and it was just a lot of work. But I think I still had that like freshman excitement, and I was motivated to do well in my classes. Freshman year, I got introduced to like the USC lifestyle. USC is a party school. So I'm talking about like, on game day, at like 8 am, students are up drinking, and doing that until the game at like four o'clock. Frat would have these huge parties. They had so much budget to throw these huge parties with DJs and free alcohol. It was just a crazy time to be 18. USC is a wet campus, which means that you can consume alcohol on the campus. So on game day, the whole campus turns into a giant tailgate and bar. If you are going to a party school, be ready for it actually to live up to its name.


I had a boyfriend from high school that I went into freshman year with. I'll just cut to the chase; it did not last. That was my first time being in like a long-distance relationship because we both went to two different colleges. Every high school student has a phase where they feel they will be with their high school sweetheart forever. Just end the relationship before you get to college. I was so confident. I was like, we're going to graduate and still be together. And you know what, I haven't talked to that person since, so it wasn't meant to be.


I was also kind of working on one of my business ventures. I was operating, "You got into where?'' Many of you guys are OG's know about "You got into where?'' was the first book that I wrote to get admission and scholarships and to college. So if you're in high school, definitely go check it out. I have it linked down below. But I also kind of turned it into like a small media company. I had college and high school writers across the world who are writing articles for the "You got into where?'' blog. And I also had a course,  which I was doing an SAT and ACT tutoring. It was so cool because I got to do some speaking engagements for it around California. I was hustling, that is a common theme throughout my whole college experience. No matter what I was going through, I always had that hustle going on.


Speaking of hustling, USC, especially our journalism students, are very into internships. When I applied to USC, I learned that most of their students had like six to 10 internships by the time they graduated. Freshman year, I was going to all of the networking events. I would go to events and company visits, and I would be the only freshman. It would literally be seniors and grad students. People would be like, "Oh, you're a freshman like. Don't worry about it, don't worry about it." Those people saying that I shouldn't be worried about it are looking for jobs right now while I have a job secured.


I'd say if you are freshmen or freshman, sophomore, junior, wherever you are, make sure going to career events, networking, even just showing up. You don't have to be the most active person in the room. But as a freshman, it's good to see how other upperclassmen interact with future employers and how you should be conducting yourself and that type of environment. You can also just build connections that can last you all four years. When it is time for you to get a job, the career advisor knows you well and is sending you jobs and referencing you to employers because that's what happens when you build relationships. You are ahead, like five steps ahead of everyone else. That was surprising to me because USC is a very competitive school to get into. All the students are really into what they're doing. I was surprised to be the only freshman on a lot of those company visits. I got to visit NBC in Los Angeles, BuzzFeed, and many different companies. I was making connections already.

The end of my freshman year ended with me breaking up with my high school boyfriend. That was some DRA-MA. Yeah, we broke up at the end of my freshman year, and my friends were all involved. I would say it ended with them kicking him out and packing up like his wet clothes from the laundry in his suitcase. It just got messy, but it was it's so funny to reflect on. Just because it was so childish. Like we were all children back then. Honestly, nothing that bad happened, but it was just all childish. That's all I have to say. So once again, just break up before you go. I mean, I'm not going to tell you what to do. But, I think everyone needs to experience that freshman year breakup for themselves.

Internship #1

When my freshman year ended, I applied to so many internships. If you know my internship story from freshman year, I applied to over 50 internships during my freshman year. People would always say companies don't look for first-year students. And they were right because I got rejected for over 50 internships. I ended up with a unique experience of getting an internship at Elle magazine. So I'll have that video linked in the description. Before I did that internship, I went to Brazil for a four-week May-mester program. May-mester is basically what the USC calls their summer programs that are in May. I did a four-week May-mester program in Sao Paulo, in Salvador, and Brazil. I don't speak Portuguese. I know like one word, one sentence.

Study Abroad #1

After a breakup, the best that you can do is travel to a foreign country and meet new people. The group I was with my best travel group to date. We would go out to clubs and then literally get back at 6 am and have class at 8 am. Like, it was reckless. I don't even know how I had all that energy. But that's what happened freshman year.


Then I went to my internship, moved to New York. I was 18 years old when I moved to New York for my internship. That summer is where I'm at my current boyfriend, Brandon, who I'm still with. So we've almost been together for three years, and we have a couples channel. Since we're a long-distance, we don't post many videos on there. But there are like 8 or 10 videos up there.

Sophomore Year

Going into sophomore year, I spent an amazing summer with my new man. Then I had to leave him to go back to LA because he was from New York. Sophomore year, I was really into maintaining a new relationship that was long distance with someone who had never been in long-distance relationships. So it was a lot of energy being spent on my phone. When I finally like, looked up for air, I realized that like, I didn't have any like involvement on campus. I didn't have any friends on campus. I kind of lost way of like my belief in quality over quantity because I saw all my other like, freshman year friends have like multiple friend groups, but I didn't have that. And so I like really was down in the dumps in my sophomore year. Mostly all of it just wasn't in the right headspace.


I was getting really annoyed with my classes. In my journalism major, I did not like them at all. I thought they were a waste of time. I just wasn't feeling it. The classes are good at USC. It is just me, not the classes. I don't want anyone to think the program wasn't good.

Campus Job

In the spring of my sophomore year, I decided to get a job at our black cultural center on campus. The goal of that was to have some extra money. But the main goal was to meet more black seniors on campus and start making friends in a way that I was comfortable with. When you work there, you interact with people all the time. The same people come in, and then you start to generate friendships with those people because you're both students. The Black Cultural Center cultivates a family there. That's how I met most of the black student body on campus.


I took action, and I applied to be on the Black Student Assembly e-board. So as you can see, I was down in the dumps, but I tried to get out of it. I never experienced anything like that before. I'm usually happy all the time. I was like, alright, I need to be around more people need to meet more people. So I joined like the board of a Black Student Assembly. I got to do some cool stuff and those positions. I'm not going to go into too much about what I did, but having on-campus jobs and being in a black space helped me reconnect and get my mood back up.

Internship #2

Then we get into the summer after sophomore year. Thankfully, I got an internship. I got an internship with NBC News in New York City, working at 30 Rock. It was great because they paid for my living expenses. They gave me a living stipend, and I got paid. My first internship at Elle magazine was not paid and also was not that fun. I was glad to be moving up the ladder. NBC was a journalism internship. I was already not feeling journalism when I went into it. So I had to be strategic. I ended up explaining to my managers that I was really into social media. So I got to do more social media than journalism, which was great. But I still did some interviews and articles, which gave me a perspective on what I went to do after graduation. Also, I was in New York again. So I got to spend an incredible summer in New York with my boyfriend. We got through that first year of long-distance, and we're glad to be together because we could spend the next three months together, living in the same city.

Junior Year

Let's get into junior year. Junior year was a mess, at least the fall semester. I lived with this crazy roommate who was not only messy, but dirty and smoked at least five to six times a day. I'm not even exaggerating, and we did not meet eye to eye. We had arguments and the RA would have to come and like knock on the door and asked us if we were okay. It just escalated out of control. The only reason I stayed there was that I was moving out of that apartment spring semester because of studying abroad. So I suppress all the memories of that because it was just such a bad time. I was trying to like, figure out everything.

Changing My Major

I changed my major to public relations. So at least I enjoyed my classes a little more during that semester, but I lived on the opposite side of campus. So I started feeling isolated again and feeling like I didn't have friends. Loneliness was just a common theme throughout my college experience. When your best friend who's your boyfriend doesn't live in the same city or same coast as you like, there's a 3 hour time difference. It has made everything a lot harder. I felt like I was friendly with people, but people didn't invite me to go anywhere. I was waiting for an invite when I should have just shown up. I didn't feel like that was. I still don't know if that's like the right how it works.


I remember one time when one of my co-workers birthday and they had a party and invited everyone except me. People would say things to me that were weird. Like, "oh, yeah, like you're so busy." And I'm like, actually, I'm not like I sit in my room and talk to a camera. That's basically my day. I think people see you have a YouTube channel. They would say like, "Oh, she's too busy to do stuff." But that's not the case. I don't even know what I'm trying to say. It was frustrating for me a lot because I had like a solid friend group that did a lot of things with in high school. I was ready to go abroad.

Study Abroad #2

So, spring semester of junior year, I got to study abroad in Madrid, Spain. I had a Spanish minor, so I was trying to it finish up. One of my goals since high school was to study in a different country. I'm so glad I got to do it uninterrupted.  Study abroad, this time was interesting because I did not know anyone else in the program. There were 20 students from USC, who I had classes with. They were apart of white sororities, and our personalities and just interest did not link up. I was the only black person in my program. I had to put the experience first rather than trying to generate genuine friendships with everyone. It was weird because I was hoping that studying abroad would be when I was going to get that solid friend group like I had when I went to Brazil.

The Brazil group was diverse, and everyone was lit. Everybody had seasoning. But Spain was the exact opposite. So I was like, Okay, I guess I'm just going to have to make the best out of the traveling, food, and learning to enjoy my own company. I would go out to eat by myself before class. I went on weekend trips to Morocco with some people I met from Canada. I had to put myself out there and do things independently, which I'm glad I got to learn and do that in a new environment. I do have a ton of videos from my study abroad trips, from all my weekend trips and going to class. I'll link my vlog channel so you guys can see my study abroad experience.

Intership #3

I had a few weeks, not even a few weeks before I moved to New York for the third summer in a row to intern at Google for the Google bold program as a marketing intern. My internship at Google was so great. I learned so much! I had an awesome team and manager. I was eating well because there's free food. My whole goal that summer was just to get a job after graduation. So I was putting out my best work. I traveled to San Francisco/ Bay Area 3 times that summer, which was really cool. I traveled to Pittsburgh on the company wallet. I was living my best bougie life, and I was in New York. Unfortunately, my boyfriend moved out of New York, so I saw him less frequently.

Emergency Surgery

I also got an emergency surgery. I had to get my appendix out, which was some drama. Two weeks before my internship ended, I had to get emergency surgery in less than a day. I went, and then they're like, yeah, you're getting surgery today, sis! My mom flew in and helped me. Honestly, just know that if you're in your early 20s and you get pain like down here is possible that your appendix is irritated or about to burst. If your appendix burst, you will die. So it was really important for me to get that taken out. The surgery went well, and the surgeon was awesome, but the recovery was not. It took me like two weeks to be able to go back to work again. They had me on the painkillers, and I needed them. After I got it out, I had pain in my shoulder. It hurt way more than my stomach area.

Senior Year

 Senior year, I decided I was living off-campus. I did not have any good enough friends to just live with. I had to live with random people, two out of my four years. I wasn't cool with anyone like that other than my freshman year roommate. But we were all like studying abroad or was living in the same place as the previous year. So come back from study abroad, trying to find somewhere to live was hard. But I ended up having a fantastic roommate. So shout out to my senior year roommate! We lived off-campus and in a two-bedroom apartment, and it was great.

Unfortunately, we had to leave early. So we're not living together anymore. I'm at home right now, but I'm still paying rent, which is ridiculous. But I did a vlog moving into that apartment. So if you want to see the apartment tour and how I decorated it, look at that. The theme for senior year was chill because I was focused on finishing. None of my classes were challenging. I was chilling because I got my Google job offer Fall semester. I work hard for that, and I was happy that the hard work paid off.


Fall semester, honestly, I can't even remember what I felt like. I was going through the motions because I was trying to graduate. Then spring semester, going through the motions until I had to leave home because of all this drama. So I'm back home right now, and I graduate next month. I'm done with classes at the end of April. It's been a whirlwind.

Other Activities

Honestly, nothing eventful has happened in my senior year. But in December, I got to go on our first group travel trip to Jamaica, which was awesome. I also started doing more things around Los Angeles because I felt like I never enjoyed LA. But senior year, I started doing more fun things like going to new clubs, bars, events. Also, Brandon got to visit me, and we did cool stuff during Valentine's Day. Then, I had to come home abruptly. So now I'm in the suburbs, not able to go outside.

Joiful Bee

The last thing I launched my natural hair brand. So the entrepreneurship trend continues. I launched my natural hair brand Joiful Bee back in February. And I'm so excited about that. Thank you to all of you guys who supported it. There's a restock coming soon for everyone who didn't get the chance to get their hands on it.

Life and Channel Update

I hoped you like this video. I tried to be as open as possible, just so you guys get a realistic view of my college career. There's so much more if you guys want me to do specific videos and different things. I didn't talk about money or budgeting like I said initially, but we talked about the drama.


I think it's crazy that I'm ending my college career at home off. And I was not able to say goodbye to my friends. It's kind of sad. But, I'm still saying positive because I'm healthy, my family's healthy, and we're safe. We're at home, enjoying each other's company. I'm thankful that I got through 4 years with no student debt. I'm going to be starting a new career in a couple of months. We're going to do part two, which will be my post-grad plans, so stay tuned for that. I'll talk to you guys next time.