Who knew you could move in without lifting a finger?

Bed, bath and new beginnings
Who knew you could move in without lifting a finger?

BY JESSICA STARK
Rice News Staff

“We’re just waiting for two more students,” said Meilani Santillan, O-Week adviser. “A few of us will wait on the curb and greet the students and parents. And then when we see one of our students, we call out to the rest of our group to begin the move-in.”

TOMMY LAVERGNE CHUCK POOL

Top: Athletics Director Chris Del Conte spares a new student from lifting a heavy box. Bottom: Rice football player John Welch helps Michelle Sam move into her residential college.

Before she could finish explaining the move-in process, her cell phone rang and she ran through the residential quad to welcome the new student with a hug.

Santillan was one of the more than 300 advisers who clad themselves in bright T-shirts to spend their Sunday in the Houston sun moving more than 700 new students into their residential colleges. The advisers lifted the boxes filled with high school yearbooks and treasured childhood souvenirs, carted laundry baskets stuffed with new linens and old sweatshirts, and pushed dollies with all kinds of electronics and household goods.
 
“They are a godsend,” said Julie Sam, Rice mom. “We didn’t know how we were going to get all of my daughter’s stuff to her room and then, before we knew it, there were students in yellow shirts unloading our car and showing us where to go.”

Sam said the ease of the move-in process calmed her anxiety about dropping off daughter Michelle at Hanszen College. Both mother and daughter said their experience with the student advisers made them feel at home.

“Even before I arrived, I felt welcomed because they had been in contact with me,” Michelle said. “I was just worried that I would be the last one here and hold everyone else up. But the advisers rushed out to meet me with these big smiles on their faces and all my nervousness was gone.”

As Michelle said that, her last item was unloaded from the family van, and she and her parents joined the team moving her in.

Organized chaos

To the naked eye, the Rice move-in process is seamless. A family arrives and is directed where to park along the inner loop. Advisers welcome each student, calling them by name and offering a hug. Joined by student-athletes, advisers unpack vehicles and haul belongings to the students’ rooms. Parents and students look on and enjoy the break from typical move-in hassles.

TOMMY LAVERGNE

After a long move-in day, students are finally able to cut loose. President Leebron sings along with new students at a barbecue hosted at the Wiess President’s House.

“Really, it’s just organized chaos,” said Alyssa Cotterman, Hanszen adviser. “We spent hours learning about these students and looking at their pictures so we could recognize them when they arrived. I’ve had my students’ names and faces memorized for weeks. I couldn’t wait for them to get here.”

Each college creates books for the advisers with information about and pictures of the new students. The advisers study the books so they can recognize the newcomers to welcome and move in the seven or eight their team is responsible for.

Advisers began training in April and cut their summers short, returning to campus the second week of August. In addition to move-in activities, advisers help students transition into the academics at Rice and the social life of their residential colleges. During O-Week, Aug. 19-25, advisers are on-call 24 hours a day.

PHOTOS BY TOMMY LAVERGNE

Top: A father takes a minute to share some words of wisdom with his daughter after helping her move in. Bottom: Hanszen advisers Sara Hartnett, Alyssa Cotterman and Holly Naylor wait for their last student to arrive.

That kind of dedication and support from her advisers helped Cotterman quickly adjust to Rice.
 
“It really made a huge difference to me, to be greeted like that,” she said. “I just wanted to be able to pass that on to these new students.”

Finding family at Rice

With the stress of the physical move-in chores absorbed by the advisers, families are able to enjoy their time together as the young adults begin a new chapter as Rice students.

“Every aspect of what we do to is designed to help the new students feel at home at Rice,” said Philip Cheng, Hanszen O-Week coordinator. “One of the most important things we do is have advisers from every class level. It shows that at Rice, there are no class divisions. Everyone is a friend. Everyone is family.”

The Rice move-in experience is a far cry from infamous stories about schools that limit move-in to twilight hours or have parking police out in full force ticketing and towing cars.

Jen Sun, a sophomore transfer student, said that her introduction to Rice has already made her feel more comfortable.

“It helps so much to have the support of all these people,” Sun said. “At my last school, we didn’t have any kind of help — we did all of it ourselves. That would have been impossible this time with that big heavy box. Now, I can relax more and focus on meeting people and getting comfortable at school.”

As with any college orientation, among the warm welcome and sunny smiles, there’s a dad giving his daughter one last word of wisdom. There’s a son proudly accepting his mother’s embrace in front of his new peers. There are parents letting go so their children can test their wings, and there are children holding on, just a little bit longer, so they can remember their roots.

And at Rice, there are new students brought into the fold of a new family, their residential colleges, by the hands of their advisers, movers and friends.