You’ve packed up everything you own in multiple cars. For the last few months, you've been dreaming about this day, spending late nights with your high school friends talking about it and shopping for more dorm supplies than you need. It’s the day you finally move into your first college dorm room. You, the eager student, and your excited but full of hesitant emotions parents pull up to the freshmen dorms. Move-in day is a whirlwind of having to get moved in, going to welcome meetings, and possibly meeting your roommate for the first time among other things. The residence life staff is buzzing all around with answers to questions, information to give out and shockingly positive attitudes for the early morning. In what seems like a brief moment of moving in, you’ve finally made it. As you stand outside of your new home and say a teary goodbye to the ones who have supported you to get to this moment, the time has come. College.
For the past few weeks, RAs have been training tirelessly for your arrival — inspecting rooms, making door decs, sitting through hours of training and waiting for your arrival. There are times when they were awake at 2 a.m. battling the butcher paper for a bulletin board asking themselves if this is worth it. But with lots of coffee, snacks and help from fellow RAs, everything gets done and move-in day has arrived.
The air feels as if there is a battle about to begin. The clock still shows 6:30 a.m. as everyone is preparing last minute things for when families arrive. Then, the first one drives up. All of the residence life staff springs into action ready for anything to be thrown their way. After all, they just spent weeks training, so they are well equipped for it all. All of a sudden, hundreds of eager parents and students fill what was a quiet building. Loads of heavy Pinterest-worthy headboards, boxes of new futons and mini fridges are being carried up the stairs. The stream of questions from parents is constant, running to solve one after the other all day. At that point, all the residence life staff tries to keep the peace within the building.
For many freshmen RAs, move-in is like Christmas morning. They are receiving all their freshmen, and they cannot wait to begin friendships with them, showing them around campus and helping them with needs and questions (like showing them where the community bathroom is). They have once been in your shoes. Today, they are here and ready to guide your through the beginning of some of the the best four years of your life.
