Every college and university now provides its own version of Freshman Orientation/Check-in. The larger universities break the freshman and transfer students into smaller more welcoming groups than the entire freshman class, but some of the smaller liberal arts colleges are able to accommodate an entire class without overwhelming everyone with the sheer numbers. Some schools even have what they call “Freshman Experience” which is a required group of core courses or seminars designed to help freshman assimilate. Everyone knows that the first year of college is a big transition year and most colleges want to help make it easier in some way.

It’s been interesting to observe freshman arriving on campus over the years. I’ve seen it from every prospective over many decades. My own was interesting and I can’t imagine it happening that way today, but in the ancient of days it was pretty common place. My belongings were packed and held to be shipped to me at UCLA as soon as I knew where I would be living. I, on the other hand, flew down to Los Angles and was picked up by friends who dropped me off rather unceremoniously on campus. In those days UCLA had one woman’s dorm and a row of sorority houses for girls to live in while going to school. If you were too late to get a room in Mira Hershey Hall or didn’t join a sorority, and if were from out of town, you were in big trouble because UCLA was primarily a commuter school! I was pretty independent. I had already spent many years as a professional actress and dancer and been on my own traveling but I still get butterflies when I think of that first week. Fortunately for me my housing worked out and I gained two sets of school families. My sorority sisters and my theater, film and television family.

Years later when my oldest son, Craig went off to UC, Berkeley my husband and I took him to orientation. The very first thing I learned there was that my son was now considered an adult and that his father and I had no official say in his education! In fact we weren’t even entitled to know his grades or even if he was still registered in school for the semester. We could pay his bills though. Craig was an athlete and was initially drawn to one of the greatest universities in the country more for their tennis team and their coach Bill Wright than for the great academics. That appreciation later changed with maturity and reality I think. I remember standing in his dorm where he would be living with not only his fellow athletes but athletes from other teams with a lump in my throat wondering how I could possibly leave him in that rank college dorm and go back to our comfortable home where he grew up? But he survived and truthfully, I know precious little about his college days which is probably just as well.

Each of our children had entirely different college experiences and I’ll probably write about many of them in the days to come. I also have had the prospective of watching incoming freshman and their families from a college professor’s point of view and have participated in Freshman Orientation and “mini-classes” that parents were invited to attend to acquaint themselves with the type of courses their students would be taking. I’ve listened to comments and heard feedback. I’ve advised freshman students, which generally ends up having more to do with transitioning and relationships than with acting classes, and I’ve served for several years as the head of a parent advisory board to a major university. Each of these experiences has given me a great appreciation for the role of the student, the parent, and the university.

In the end, I think the best start for a student is when the student and parent are welcomed by the college in a meaningful way with each of them enjoying a parallel path in the process and having time to say goodbye quickly as they move into their new roles. In truth, it’s the rare student who wants their parent to decorate their dorm room. The credit card comes in handy for shopping but the decisions need to be theirs and the sooner they get to it the better.