It’s easy to feel on top of the world after senior year of high school. Coming from the top of the totem pole, so comfortable and confident in your environment, to a community so new and untouched can be a weird transition.
At the same time, leaving high school in the past and jumping into the unchartered territory of university life may be exactly what you craved for so long: the opportunity to start anew can be so appealing that you enter college and forget why you went there in the first place.
The first semester of your first year is both thrilling and unfamiliar. Being thrust into such a diverse environment made up of students from a multitude of backgrounds with an array of interests, combined with the nature of undergraduate life itself, can be a lot to handle.
The community you are a part of and the environment you live in during this pivotal period in your life will have a defining impact on your college career as a whole.
The amount of money and care the University is putting into the new first-year residence hall on Central campus showcases just how much it cares about the experience of its newest students.
Though ResLife’s plan to enforce programmed housing for incoming first-years is extreme without the input of students, the new campus environment being fostered by UVM’s vast construction efforts will have more of an impact on students than anything else.
Having such a state-of-the-art space so close to academic halls, with a built-in dining hall and walkway to Bailey/Howe Library, will change the experience of every first-year student who comes to UVM.
Winter temperatures plummet to excruciating lows; having the ability to roll out of bed and head to the library in your pajamas, without facing exposure from the brutal Vermont air will give first-year students the tools they need to succeed in an environment geared toward their success.
We applaud the University for effectively using its construction resources to build a community that is both beautiful and serves to aid its most vulnerable students.
