Midyears get warm welcome into Brandeis family

View snapshots of Brandeis midyears moving into their new homes

Photos/Mike Lovett
The start of 2016 represented a new beginning in more ways than one for the 84 midyear and 22 transfer students who became the newest members of the Brandeis family on Friday, Jan. 8.
 
Hailing from 19 U.S. states and 10 countries, the undergraduate students were eager to join the Brandeis community and begin their studies.
 
“I’m pretty excited to finally be here,” said Sage Rosenthal ’19, who is from Great Neck, New York, and spent her first semester studying abroad in London. “I’m just ready to start going to classes and meet and get to know more people.”
 
San Francisco native Samara Meyer ‘19, meanwhile, was especially happy to finally arrive in her new home after bringing her belongings cross-country from the west coast.
 
“It definitely took a lot of planning and compartmentalizing to get all my stuff here, but it’s in my new room now and that’s what matters,” Meyer said. “What’s next for me is to meet new people, I’m excited for that.”
 
To facilitate their transition to campus, the new students participate in an orientation program that features a number of activities and events organized by Orientation Leaders, or OLs, to familiarize them to Brandeis’ academics, resources, culture and social scene.
 
“When I was a new student, orientation and the OLs really helped me acclimate to the community,” said Michael Arguello ’16, an OL. “I want to have that same impact on the first years and I want to be able to help welcome, even if it’s just a little bit, these great people to our community and the Brandeis experience.”
 
After moving into their rooms inside the Village Residence Hall, the new students and their families made their way to the Shapiro Campus Center for a welcome ceremony with Interim President Lisa M. Lynch and Senior Vice President of Students and Enrollment Andrew Flagel.
 
Both Lynch and Flagel promised the new students that Brandeis and its community would become a second family and that the university’s rich breadth of academic resources and faculty would open their minds to new perspectives and discoveries.
 
However, it was the sense of togetherness, inclusion and unity that Lynch said would be the biggest asset for new students while at Brandeis.
 
“This is a family that from today on will be yours for the rest of your lives,” Lynch said. “It’s a very rich and diverse family, committed to academic excellence and to rigorous debate.
 
“It is a family that will challenge, a family that will see you through good and bad and is excited to see you as you begin this phase of your lives.”
 
Following the convocation, the students said goodbye to their families and set out to join the campus community and begin their Brandeis experience.

Categories: General, Student Life

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