Being homeschooled all her life, Olympic athlete Chloe Kim dreamed of a normal learning experience (via Time Magazine). And what’s more normal than going to college? Of course, you’d expect the experience to be a little different for a celebrity, but nothing too drastic.
Unfortunately for Kim, she was treated more like a guest than an actual student, which impacted her ability to make friends and build a life at Princeton. “As I was leaving, the girls came up to me, they’re like, ‘Chloe, can we get a picture, can we get a picture, can we get a picture?'” she says of her time in class. “And I was like, ‘I don’t want to be here as the snowboarder. I want to be here as a student. I want to be like everyone else. I want to be normal.'”
It only got worse when Kim tried to maintain her privacy by refusing photos. Students would call her vulgar names and were generally rude to her. Eventually, she found a few friends who treated her normally, though the struggle to be a regular student severely impacted her mental health (via Olympics).
Unfortunately, it’s too early to tell if Kim will return to Princeton following this bad experience, but she did make a plea to her fellow students, “So to anyone that’s here at Princeton and sees me at the dining hall or anywhere, please just remember that I’m a human being and I want a true, fun college experience.”
