Ahh, the joys of college life. Independence from your parents, from a curfew, from rules and regulations. You can get up when you want to, go to bed when you want to. You can eat pizza for three meals a day and pull an all-night to finish your economics project. You can watch movies all day on Saturday and carve out your niche at the library claiming it as your own for the entire academic year. The freedom is great; but I think some of it goes to a person’s head and they forget basic human functionality. What is up with all the students who go to class still in their pajamas?

Sure, the baggy PJ bottoms you wore to bed last night are more comfortable than anything else in your closet. And maybe you really did need those last 15 minutes of sleep that had you running to class to beat the bell. But seriously, you couldn’t at least slip on jeans? Dress it up a little bit?

The PJ phenomenon is country-wide in the US, probably elsewhere in the world as well. But the interesting thing is that those pajamas students are too lazy to change out of are impacting their grades negatively. It’s common knowledge that when we take the time to care for our appearance we do better at the task at hand. The mantra, ‘Dress for the job you want, not the job you have’ comes to mind.

I asked a college history professor what she thinks about the students who attend class in pajamas and was only semi-surprised at her response. She said that if a student didn’t take the time to dress before coming to her class she knew he/she did not take it seriously. But more importantly, when it came time for grading if that same student was teetering between two grades she would give them the lower grade because of the lack of effort. 

So please, at least keep a pair of jeans at the end of your bed to slip on before booking it off to class. And even better if you can manage to actually put real time and effort into looking your best even if it is just to sit at a desk and take notes. Who knows it could mean the difference between an A and a B.