Five steps to a successful first week

Start out on the Right Foot:

Five steps to a successful first week

5. Map out classes and route times- No one wants to get lost trying to find their class and stumble in 15 minutes late on their first day. The Saturday or Sunday before classes begin, scope out where your classes are. Take a map and feel free to meander around the campus learning the quickest routes and even the location of the room inside the building. (I’ve gotten lost in Williard and so many other buildings that I would have to backtrack and start over!) Invite your Roommate or the girls who live in the dorm next to you. Not only is it a great way to meet new friends but they will likely have classes in different buildings which allows you to familiarize yourself to campus even more!

4. Keep your door open- Your RA’s will probably talk to you about “Open Door Policy” and you might want to just shove it aside, but don’t! It really works! People will walk by and they might see a poster or something in your room and stop to talk to you about. It’s a great way just to learn about your floor mates and become more comfortable in your dorm. Feel free to return the favor and strike up a conversation if someone has their door open, I mean, they left it open for a reason!

3. Go out of your comfort zone- Every college freshman coming into school barely knows anyone. You’re in the same boat, everyone in that first week just wants a friendly face, to know they aren’t on their own. So, the more outgoing you are, the more people will open up to you. You’re in college now! Do something bold to make friends that you wouldn’t normally do! Towards the end of my first week of freshman year, I was sitting in my friend’s dorm next door to mine. We decided we didn’t have enough guy friends so we grabbed post it notes and ran up to the boys floor above us. We went around sticking post it notes telling the guys to come visit us and get to know us. Some boys happened to be watching us do this and struck up a conversation. Now we are all so close, we go on vacations together during the summer.

2. Plan out a basic daily schedule and goals- I’m a planner. I write literally every moment of my day down in a daily planner but what I love to do at the beginning of each semester is make up a rough daily schedule. You can do it on Microsoft Excel or just with a piece of paper and a pen. I go through hour by hour of the day. I set a goal to wake up by a time, pencil in my classes, color code possible times I could fit in a workout, take time to relax or buckle down and study. (Did I mention I was a planner?) I also go through my goals for the semester and add them in at the bottom. Then I print it out and post it right next to my mirror or on my closet door, somewhere I can’t miss it so I can keep it in my mind. The quicker you get into a routine, the quicker you can adjust to the life and differences of college.

1. Create a home away from home- Bring comfort items from home. It could be stuffed animals, pictures, yearbooks, blankets, anything! (Thanks to Toy Story 3, I had to bring all of my stuffed animals because I thought one of them would feel left out if I didn’t bring them…) Anyway, I filled my room of pictures of my family and friends from home. Every time I got a card from my family I put it up on the wall to read when I was discouraged or down. I made my dorm room into a little bubble of home. Everyone gets lonely in that first week, but it’s nice to know with these items that you’re really not that far from a home. As time wore on, I brought less and less comfort items from home and filled my room with more pictures and notes from college, but that only comes with time. Although, after Christmas break, you’ll be surprised to learn how quickly Penn State becomes a part of you!

So remember- Be yourself and be outgoing. Keep home close to your heart but try new things and your heart will grow to fit in your new home away from home.

See you at WEPO

Maggie Golden is a junior in Architectural Engineering. This summer Maggie worked for Brinjac Engineering in Harrisburg, PA. She is a mentor for WEPO 12.

The "Pennypacker" Experience

Move-in day, Freshman year. I don’t know the campus, I’m leaving all my friends and family behind me and I’m in a nerd dorm. I applied at my mom’s persistence for the housing of First Year Science and Engineering dorm in East Halls and on move-in day, that was the last place I wanted to be. I couldn’t help but think- no one will talk to each other, they will all be weird, I won’t have any friends but at least it will be quiet. And quiet it was, I was barely around the first move-in day because I was already moved in and I wanted to be with my WEPO team because they are the only friends I knew at State. But I retreated back to my dorm for the mandatory ice breaker activities. Preparing myself for the worst I sat down to a girl who looked pretty normal and I turned to say hello. We bonded over how weird Pennypacker sounded. Academic football competitions? Tutors in our building? Then to top it off, the next day we were dragged out of bed at 7 in the morning to get pictures in our Pennypacker shirts. We were miserable but at that I met her roommate. Our bonding was complete and both of those girls ended up becoming my best friends at Penn State. From then on Pennypacker just grew more awesome. It was more than just another hall in east. It was more than that. I was able to extremely close to so many people because they were taking the same courses as me and in a lot of my classes. I had class with almost every one of my Pennypacker friends. It made studying and homework so much easier because I could just go up a floor to ask my genius friend for help. We all had a surprising amount in common and never got sick of each other. By the end of the year my group of friends from Pennypacker were glued together. Now I know that this isn’t the first time this has happened. I’ve met many past and present Pennypackerians that feel the same way as my friends and I. I don’t know how that building does it, maybe it is everyone’s stereotypical dread on move-in day, the early morning wake up call, our common hobbies or the magic of the building but The “Pennypacker” Experience went from something so dreaded to something my friends and I will miss very much. And now I’m moving into another hall and I’m nervous now that I have the opposite problem of too high expectations, I guess I can thank Pennypacker for that.

Maggie Golden is a Sophomore in Architectural Engineering. She will be a WEPO Rover this year and is also involved in Vole, SSAE, SWE and THON. This summer, she had an internship with Brinjac Engineering as Lighting Design Intern in Harrisburg, PA.