Are Flash Drives and Jump Drives the same things?

They are the same animal.

You'd think that a college would use the name commonly used by the whole industry, but no, they have to use jump, which is an old (read ancient) term.

In modern language all you need to ask for is a 4 Gigabyte USB2 flash drive. Pick a good known make like HP model 120 or 130. They cost less than US$20. Theres enough room on there to store hundreds of mp3s, photos, and 20 years of college notes.

The other option if your funds stretch to it is an mp4 player so you can play movies and music on it as well as do your college stuff.

Back up the stick regularly. Even the best ones do die in the end after a few thousand read/write cycles, and they are tiny - so easy to loose or steal. Get it engraved with your phone number if that worries you, it deters thieves and measn you might get it back if lost. The HP have a metal case whcih can be engraved. Shame to loose some critical notes just before an exam.

Hope you are enjoying college. Your last years of relative freedom. I miss it.

Jump drive, flash drive, usb drive, usb stick, usb key, all the same thing, just different name.

The only thing I would recommend is to check with the collage to find out what they would recommend for brand. There are many educational institutes that certain usb drives would not work on their systems.

Yes, same thing...usb connection

Yep..same thing, just different name.