It only took 19 hours to fall in love with Vandy
I have been at Vanderbilt University for two and a half years now and I could probably compile you a list around 3,487,298 pages long stating all of the reasons I have come to love Vanderbilt; but we will get to that later. Right now I want to tell you about the 19 hours that made me fall in love with Vanderbilt.
5:15pm – My mom drops me off with my freshman host who will be showing me a day… and night… in the life of a student. I had never met Elizabeth before, but she was a friend of a friend so I was looking forward to staying with her. I get my stuff settled in her dorm in Barnard Hall and get a tour of the building.
6:30pm – I am heading to dinner at Fiesta Azteca, a local Mexican haunt frequented by Vandy students, with Elizabeth and her friends. They make me feel right at home, asking me about high school, what other schools I’m looking at, and boys. I feel like I’m having dinner with my friends from home.
10:45pm – We all head over to the fraternities for a band party at one of the houses. This was my first college visit so I had no idea what I was getting myself into. However, Elizabeth and her friends made sure to introduce me to people and make sure I was having fun.
12:00pm – I meet a boy named Kevin while listening to the band; he ends up being one of my great friends in the years to come. Everyone else I meet is so friendly and is just out to have a good time and dance off another hard week of studying. We spend the rest of the night dancing and talking before we head back to Barnard for some much needed sleep.
10:00am – I experience my first hall shower/bathroom trip. Truthfully, it wasn’t nearly as strange as I expected. If fact, I learned to get used to it very quickly after moving in my freshman year.
11:00am – I walk into my first ever college classroom in the Payne building on Peabody, a Human and Organizational Development class taught by Professor Dokecki. I had no idea what was going on in the class, but they were working on a group project so I was able to observe some small conversations about the subject. Little did I know at the time, but I would be taking that exact same class, in the exact same classroom with the exact same professor my junior year at Vanderbilt.
12:15pm – My mom meets me outside my class to take me back to the real world. She wants to know about everything I did and everyone I met, but all I want to talk about is what I need to do to get into Vanderbilt. Some people learn calculus in classrooms, some learn how to do fancy engineering equations, but that day in that classroom I learned that Vanderbilt was the place for me.
When I got home the next day, my application was in the mail. After spending only a few hours on campus, I knew it was where I belonged. The people I met, the facilities I saw, and the classroom feel I got, went straight to my heart and I knew I had fallen in love with Vanderbilt. Since that day I have never looked back, and would never change a thing.
Visiting classes is a fantastic way to enhance your trip to campus! We have offerings in all four schools and if there is a class you want that isn’t listed then reach out to the department or professor.