Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa, California

Great school, the best available. Lots of caring professors with real world experience of their respective fields. It is a large campus with lots of parking, however in the first month or so of any semester, parking is scarce and overflows to the OC Fairgrounds. Parking is only free the first 2 weeks of the regular semester and first 1 week of accelerated semesters. Otherwise, you must get a parking pass from the Adams lot in the back corner close to gym and baseball fields, or the lots located along Fairview off Pirates way and over by the Theater and Campus Safety office. You can get one citation forgiven, after that don't count on it, even if you had a parking pass and forgot to put it on. Campus safety aggressively checks cars like clockwork throughout the day up until the last class let's out at night. If you have car trouble, they can and will help, though. They can also escort you to your car if you are still on campus late. Parking is physically tight for larger vehicles and most people park badly and make spaces even more cramped. The widest spaces are located by in the parking lots by the library and arts buildings. The library is top notch and there is a full Starbucks located next to it. The cafeteria offers great and reasonably-priced choices. There are other student ran food stands over by the foreign language building as well with some healthier options. Counseling appointments are hard to schedule, but can be booked easily every Thursday morning on the school website, or you can book in person in the Watson building 3rd floor. You will need to see a counselor to set and change your major, and also to find out how to graduate or transfer. The school has great relationships with many top universities, local and in other states. The honors program is a great opportunity to get a leg up on transferring to a top university. The honors courses are not really harder, you just have a little extra work than the normal course does. No matter what your interest is, OCC has something that will interest you. They have great vocational and certification programs, and can help you with job and internship opportunities. There are many highly successful OCC Alums looking to hire and know that the students got top notch education. Some very famous people and brands got their start at this school. My best advice is to make as many friends as possible and network always. You are at a school with a very large international pool of students and you can get some very great first hand cultural experiences if you are open to it. You never know who you may meet at OCC, it could be a future CEO of a Fortune 500 company. These are the best tips I can pass along after my 5 years at OCC. I went at my own pace and learned invaluable skills for all areas of life, I hope you to too!