Coping with change and School Dreams

I haven't written anything on the site for a long time. There's been allot of change in my life lately and I've been trying to adjust while keeping a positive attitude. I've been finding myself struggling and questioning myself but fortunately I think I'm pulling out of it and getting back to my cheerful confident selfe. ;o)
I've had some starnge dreams in the last couple of weeks but two in particular stick out. I want to write them down and hopefully someone can help me gain some insight on these.

The first dream I'm a student and I'm on a college campus. I'm happy as anything and I'm running around the whole place meeting new people and trying to take in as much as I can. I come to a park on the campus that has a lake. Near the edge of the lake are two big devices that provide drainage. Their metal, like a long box and the way you start the draining process is by flipping the top oipen which activates a valve. These devices are also back to back. There's a woman who is opening the first device and starting the draining process. As she's opening the lid she's stepping back. I notice that she's goign to trip and fall into the other device but I'm too late.
an alarm goes off and I run to the lake to jump in and help her. When I get to the lake I notice other people that have jump in to help her but now they need help also. The look like they're frozen or in a trance state. These lifegaurds appear and they're dressed in these orange/yellow suits. they jump in and hold hands and form a circle around the people who have fallen in. the circles reminded me of the skydivers when they hold hands as they fall. In any case the circle of people rotate with the trapped person in the middle. I'm puzzled and I hear someone say to me, this is the only way we can save them. I wake up.

The second dream I'm in a school building with many stories. Everyone thinks there's only the stairs and the elevators to help you get up and down all of these levels in the school. Me being the mischievouse soul that I am, I start nosing around and discover another method that is deep within the building. The system is a double helix and looks like the dna pictures they always show on the science channels like Discovery. (From this point on my memory of the dream is fragmented so please stick with me). I'm able to get up and down the the levels of the school allot easier and quicker than the other two methods and chuckle to myself at my new discovery. I bump into another person who is around the age of a teenager. I cannot recall if he wanted to destroy the device or was nervouse about someone wanting to destroy it. I know that during our conversation a female student appeared all of a sudden that scared him. I don't know if she was there to destory it or prevent him from it. I did not feel threatened by any of them though; I remember being real curiose as to why one of them wanted to destroy it. End of dream