United States
In the United States, freshman, rather than being a slang term, is officially used by most high schools and universities.
Freshman is commonly in use as an US English idiomatic term to describe a beginner or novice, someone who is naive, a first effort, instance, or a student in the first year of study (generally referring to high school or university study).
New members of Congress in their first term are referred to as freshmen senators or freshman congressman, no matter how experienced they were in previous government positions.
High School first year students are almost exclusively referred to as Freshmen, or in some cases by their grade year, 9th graders. Second year students are Sophomores, or 10th graders, then Juniors or 11th graders, and finally Seniors or 12th graders.
At College or University Freshman denotes students in their first year of study. The grade designations of high school are not used, but the terms Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors are kept at most schools. Some Women's colleges in the US do not use the term Freshman, but use the perceived gender neutral term: First Year, instead. Some liberal arts colleges do not use the terms Freshman, Sophomore, etc. at all, but rather stick to First Year, Second Year, Third Year, and Fourth Year designations. Beyond the fourth year, students are simply classified as fifth years, sixth years, etc. Some institutions use the term freshman for specific reporting purposes.
Read more about this topic: Freshers
Famous quotes related to united states:
“What lies behind facts like these: that so recently one could not have said Scott was not perfect without earning at least sorrowful disapproval; that a year after the Gang of Four were perfect, they were villains; that in the fifties in the United States a nothing-man called McCarthy was able to intimidate and terrorise sane and sensible people, but that in the sixties young people summoned before similar committees simply laughed.”
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)
“... the yearly expenses of the existing religious system ... exceed in these United States twenty millions of dollars. Twenty millions! For teaching what? Things unseen and causes unknown!... Twenty millions would more than suffice to make us wise; and alas! do they not more than suffice to make us foolish?”
—Frances Wright (1795–1852)
“The city of Washington is in some respects self-contained, and it is easy there to forget what the rest of the United States is thinking about. I count it a fortunate circumstance that almost all the windows of the White House and its offices open upon unoccupied spaces that stretch to the banks of the Potomac ... and that as I sit there I can constantly forget Washington and remember the United States.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“And hereby hangs a moral highly applicable to our own trustee-ridden universities, if to nothing else. If we really wanted liberty of speech and thought, we could probably get it—Spain fifty years ago certainly had a longer tradition of despotism than has the United States—but do we want it? In these years we will see.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
“America—rather, the United States—seems to me to be the Jew among the nations. It is resourceful, adaptable, maligned, envied, feared, imposed upon. It is warm-hearted, overfriendly; quick-witted, lavish, colorful; given to extravagant speech and gestures; its people are travelers and wanderers by nature, moving, shifting, restless; swarming in Fords, in ocean liners; craving entertainment; volatile. The schnuckle among the nations of the world.”
—Edna Ferber (1887–1968)