My elder daughter has just started University, the same one I attended in the early- to mid-90s (completely different curriculum, though). A few days ago, she was telling me what her first impressions were, and of course it brought back memories of my own first day there.
My parents drove me to my dorm shortly after lunch and we spent a couple of hours unpacking stuff: food and drinks, clothes and school supplies. They left in the late afternoon.
On my way back from the parking lot, I noticed that a football match was going on on the field behind my dorm. Since I didn’t really know what to do, I watched it (1-0). I remember noting with a false sense of surprise that the air that I breathed didn’t feel any different from that in my hometown 80 miles away.
Then, I went back to my room, and cooked my first dinner. By the time I finished, it was still early evening, way too early to go to bed, and I was at a loss what to do. I grew so bored that I ended up reading the University safety booklet, hoping that I’d soon get to study more engaging stuff.
And… that’s it. I really enjoyed my student days in the end but my very first day there was rather anticlimactic.
There was a guy handing out frisbees and sunglasses and oh hey yeah if you sign right here you can put in for a college credit card, and the teen next to me signed right up and excitedly said, “it’s like free money!”
A lot of other stuff happened that day, but that’s what sticks in the memory.
I met my best friends for the next few formative years that day. Forty-five years later I can still vividly remember each of them and the good and bad times we had growing up as young, independant adults.
I got to the dorms a day or so earlier than most other students because I’d been on a college-sponsored canoe trip. I can’t remember now if my parents brought my stuff first or we met after, but at any rate I was ahead of my two roommates.
I got my stuff set up and was sitting on my bed holding a stuffed elephant my sister had given me (very fancy, he was made with brown fur, possibly old mink stole!) and wondering “now what?”. A guy popped his head in at the door and said he was the RA from the guy’s side (split floors in this dorm) and we chatted a bit.
That was in 1980, and I just heard his alarm go off in the bedroom
It’s 1989. My Mum drove me the 100 odd miles to help me settle into my room. I was to stay in ‘Halls’ which is basically what we call on-campus student accommodation in the UK. It was a rather grand looking hogwarts-esque building.
I had a room to myself on the ground floor, which was basic enough to feel a bit like a prison cell with a single bed and a desk. Bathrooms down the hall. My mother’s face was a picture. I don’t think she wanted to leave me. I’ve checked the photos on the site above and it doesn’t look like it has changed at all. including the rather grim shared bathrooms
Once she had gone, I went downstairs for dinner in the large dining hall (the halls were fully catered) and sat at a large table making polite chat with other newbies. We then adjourned to the hall bar - every hall had it’s own bar, with fully stocked alcohol, subsidised prices, and bar games like pool tables. I hung out there all night. Made some friends for life on that first might.
I must have done other things on the first day, but honestly can’t remember.
Freshmen arrived on campus a few days ahead of the rest of the student body for Freshman Orientation. There were planned dorm activities for us to get to know each other, see how things worked, which other dorms we were rivals with, which of the women’s dorms we’d be paired up with for social events, etc.
My dad had driven me up, and we spent the first afternoon building my bed loft, unpacking the car. My roommate was on the football team, so I didn’t see him much at all (a theme that would continue the rest of the year). That night there was a big social event for all the freshmen to mingle and make friends. I’m still extremely close with many of the people I met that night.
I don’t remember much about the courses on the first day. I remember we were told there was an information session in the main auditorium that evening.
So everybody attended, the guy started giving out info on various topics, and then a gang irrupted into the auditorium and said “we’ve locked the doors, this is initiation week”. There was no violence or anything, they were trying to be friendly I guess, but they had chosen to stage it as looking violent, which was a fucking bad idea. One guy escaped the room, then was brought back a few minutes later and they showed his bald head, implying they’d just shaved it. It was meant to be intimidating, and I (male, 18) was fully intimidated.
A girl I happened to know, who was seated close to me, told me it was all fictional and for show, the guy was probably already bald, etc. Afterwards some people did leave – the doors weren’t locked after all – and were booed, but nobody prevented them physically. Since I was not participating in the general cheer, somebody came to my seat to try to get me on stage; I managed to look menacing enough (or maybe terrified enough?) that they gave up.
I don’t remember how the evening ended, I was just glad to leave unharmed. I still hated their guts. Still unsure if I would somehow get “punished” if I didn’t show up, I participated in a few initiation activities (that weren’t humiliating) that week, but I still resented that first evening. Afterwards I didn’t participate in anything social with my peers for my entire bachelor’s degree.
My first day was spent unpacking, meeting my roommate and other people on the floor of my dorm, mostly just getting settled in.
My first night was the first of many times that the fire alarm went off in the middle of the night. My roommate and I both forgot to grab our keys and locked ourselves out of our room.
First day of class the teacher handed out the Syllabus and briefly discussed the goals for the class. We were usually dismissed early.
That’s because Week 1 is Add/Drop. The Syllabus often scares off a few students. The open seats fill with Adds that wanted that section
My biggest memory was finding my way around campus. It was so confusing. I transferred from a local community college with only three buildings.
Thank goodness my college didn’t have dormitories. It was a commuter college with a nice mix of young and older students.
They’ve built dormitories since I graduated and force unmarried Freshman students to live there.
They also cut many Sections of classes at night. Making it difficult for working adult students to attend. The Freshman and Sophomore classes have Sections at night. But the upper level classes don’t. Forcing Adult students to give up their day jobs or not graduate.
I’m so thankful I attended a Commuter College. The adults always contributed real world insights during class discussions.
What I remember from my first day was the feeling of freedom. I’d been raised with parents who watched over everything I did (well, they tried to). To suddenly have no curfew was amazing.
I wandered past a frat house, and a guy introduced himself and put a beer in my hand. “So, Digs, ya drunk yet?” “Nope…” “Welllll, why the hell not?” (Well, because my folks would kill me, but they’re not here! It was the best-tasting beer I’ve ever had.)
Come to think of it, I ended up living with him and a couple of other guys I met at that party.
My parents put me on plane because I’d decided to go to a college 1200 miles away they couldn’t drive me. I had a suitcase of stuff, and they’d be shipping some things later - my college did ( and still does) outdoor orientation trips so I wouldn’t be on campus for about 4 days after day one.
I arrived at the airport, found the campus shuttle, got keys in the student center and finally found my dorm room. Then I met with my orientation group for dinner and prep for departure the next morning. The one thing I specifically remember about that first meeting with the orientation group was asking one of them where they’d got their college sweatshirt and them looking at me like I was an idiot and saying “the bookstore”.
I wasn’t first gen, but my father didn’t go away for school and we hadn’t had the money to do any campus tours. I didn’t realize that college gear was a thing.
Drove approximately 90 miles to get me into the dorms at about 8:00, process took a few hours. Parents said goodbye around noon and we hugged, Mom shed a tear or two but I did not – I was never more thrilled than I was to see their rear license plate driving away. I hated being at home, I hated high school even more, and all I had wanted for the previous, oh, decade, was to get my ass out of Springfield, IL and out from under my parents’ roof.
Met my roommate (returning sophomore) and exchanged pleasantries with him. Met another guy a couple of doors down who offered me a ham sandwich his mom had packed for him, which he didn’t want. A couple of doors down this way, some guys were playing chess, a couple of doors down that way, a couple were hitting the bong, a few more this way and some were watching porn on his VCR (this was 1988). I chose the porn room and chatted it up with my new friends. Went downstairs to the cafeteria for supper at about 5:30, and that was it. Later that night we had a meeting with the women of our floor, but I don’t remember much other than laughing at the difference between the men’s RA’s shirts (Wetzel 13 - it’s better on top) and the women’s RA’s shirts (Wetzel 13 - we’re a floor above the rest).
September, 1967. I took a redeye on standby, to save money, from Portland (Oregon) to Chicago, and landed about 6am (my first airplane flight, Boeing 707, middle seat). I think I had one big suitcase and a small carry-on. One box of other stuff was being shipped. I shared a cab from the airport with a couple of other people from my high school who were also going to University of Chicago, both a year ahead of me. It was a beautiful, mildly warm fall day.
It was so early, at the dorm I had to wait a little while to get in. I don’t remember exactly what I did next, probably dumped my bags in my room (typical 2-person dorm room, desk and bed on each side), claimed a side, and went down to breakfast. My roommate wasn’t there yet.
My dorm building was 10 stories on the corner of E. 57th and S. University. I was on the 3rd floor. There was a fire station across 57th. Lacking any required activities at the time, I went for an exploratory walk around. I might have gone in any direction, but I went south, past a bunch of playing fields, west to S. Ellis, then south again to E. 60th, and turned east. There was a very long cyclone fence on the school side, so I walked along that. In those days, Hyde Park was a kind of enclave that ended at E. 60th, and on the other side was apartment blocks and smaller apartment buildings, a whole different neighborhood that appeared to me to be pretty much 100% black. Oops, I thought. Is this one of those neighborhoods into which I shouldn’t venture, especially alone? It was quite a long stretch from S. Ellis to the next opportunity to go back towards the school, which was S. Woodlawn. Nothing whatever happened, no-one paid any attention to me. A tiny bit of education for my first day.
I attended a small private Christian college. First day was a hot summer day, we went around filling forms, getting name tags, doing orientation, then gathering in outdoors tents for meals, hearing the president of the college give some sort of political/academic talk, etc.
Labour day weekend 1991. I had actually been on the campus a week or two earlier as well to choose my classes. In the days before online anything, that was done on paper. As Montreal is just two hours away from my folks’ place in east-end Ottawa, it wasn’t a big deal.
But on the long weekend, my parents and sister drove me from Ottawa to the McGill campus to a residence perched halfway up the mountain. I was assigned a “boxcar” room (long and skinny) whose window had a stunning view of downtown Montreal. My mother commented that I’d never be able to afford a view like that again, and for once she was right. Plugged in my computer and my cassette/radio…maybe we went to lunch before they left? A handful of people passed by and introduced themselves, and I met my “floor fellow” (floor supervisor). I spent the weekend leading up to the first day of classes exploring downtown Montreal both alone and in a group of my floormates. I forget what my first actual class was…something mathy, or maybe intro to Japanese.
I was in the marching band, and we were allowed to arrive at the dorms a day early. I drove by myself, and when I got to the exit off the interstate there was a sign: left is the next city over, right is the college. I sat there for minute, wondering what would happen if I turned left. Of course I had no intention of turning left, but it made me think. It helped that I had an older sister who was also in the band, so that helped with the first day.
MIT in 1969 did things in a weird way. My father drove me from New York to Cambridge, and put me and my trunk in a dorm, but it was not my assigned dorm. The first week then was rush week, where the off-campus fraternities desperately tried to recruit students to fill their houses. I went to one of the parties, got drunk, got the phone number of a freshman girl from BU, and slept at the frat. The next morning they were issuing invitations. I don’t know if I would have gotten one (probably not, it was a Catholic frat and I was Jewish) but I decided frat life wasn’t for me anyhow and split.
During that week we gave preferences for dorms. I guess they delayed to get rid of the students who decided to pledge. My first choice was the best dorm, I got assigned one near the bottom. I stood in the room assignment line there when two guys came in, offering to trade their slots in the best dorm for one there. One guy took it, I finally decided I didn’t have anything to lose, and did it also. Best move in my life, since my floor mates were great people I still talk to and I met my wife because I was in this dorm.
Then you had a mass move of luggage from your temp dorm to your final one. Total chaos.
My kids had it much easier, having their rooms assigned ahead of time and even getting their roommates identified.
I went to university in Sydney. It’s our state capital but 650 miles away from home.
The family are based on the NSW/Vic border. Virtually all were educated over the border. Melbourne was 300 miles away and the source of much of our services. News, power, petrol etc. Not sure I knew who my State Premier was. Knew John Cain was the recently installed Premier of Victoria.
So I had no family and knew virtually nobody in Sydney. My first time solo in a big city.
On my first day I had to enroll in my various courses and establish accommodation. I wasn’t studying at one of the big faculties, so nothing necessary was in the same place. With all the worldly experience of a sea-going tadpole I was drawn into the administrative morass of the University and was severely mauled. I queued interminably to enroll in courses I didn’t need. Then queued to unenroll. I signed up for higher level courses than I needed as prerequisites. Purchased texts I didn’t need. Walked from lower to upper campus and back way more times than necessary.
Finally, just before 5pm I found my way to my School’s Administrator to get the final sign-off. Hadn’t spoken to the same person twice all day as strangers, probably well meaning, shook their heads and directed me to another queue or building. Must have looked crest-fallen. Felt like I’d gone half a dozen rounds as a lightweight fighting a heavy weight. Unsaid was my plea, “Please Sir … just sign that fucking form.”
He looked at me and said “Have they taken you through the wringer, son? Welcome to the Department of Obfuscation”. And signed.
I looked up the phrase in my new dictionary when I got to my souless digs after gormlessly navigating an unfamiliar public transport system. That’s been the sign over my study, desk or office ever since.
I ready enjoyed uni, but it was a very average start.
1979, I drove myself around 400 miles. I was happy until my crazy roommate arrived a day or two later. (and a day or two late). I learned I despise having roommates.
Everything else was cool. Went to get my student ID. The guy asked “what birthdate do you want on it?” We had a gathering in the dorm that evening, some kind of orientation. The college president stopped by. People were passing a joint around. He didn’t seem to mind. There were truly no rules, and some people couldn’t handle it. Most stepped up and got a good education though.
