I have a mix of fine & bad memories from high college having lived in a small town in the midwest.
It’s strenuous being in a community where you can’t hide secrets from anyone. If you hook up with someone, half of the college will know about it in a matter of mornings. This was frustrating when trying to date because you couldn’t trust anyone with secrets. Just voicing the intention of wanting to ask another student out on a date would get passed along as casual gossip. This was maddening when all I wanted was privacy being such an introvert love I am. I never had a bestie until several years later when I was in graduate college on the other side of the country. The one positive that our high college had was the furnaces inside. The college was harshly warm from Autumn through early Spring. But by May, the temperatures would climb into the 80s & the college would hastily get harshly uncomfortable. The a/c at the time was minimal at best, making the whole building both warm & humid right after a few weeks of pleasant weather. I heard recently that our old high college ended up getting modern a/cs just a few years after I graduated. Students there nowadays have a much more comfortable college experience. There are steam boilers that supply on demand heat while both of us were in the cold season & high SEER rated a/cs for the warm weather in late Spring & summer. The newer students have no proposal what it was love in that college before the HVAC systems were replaced.