Taking your next step as a young adult can be filled with a significant amount of emotions. Such as worry, concern, overwhelmed, loss, sad and many other emotions.

 Continuing your education and moving either across the world or right down the road from your home can be scary. Especially leaving everything you know behind and living somewhere unfamiliar.

Beginning college comes with stages: applying to Averett, receiving your acceptance letter, gathering and starting to plan out your dorm, packing up your childhood room, saying goodbye to your friends and family at home,  and enjoying your shower without shower shoes (if you live in a dormitory) and giving your pets one last belly rub before leaving all you know behind to begin your own journey as a young adult.

Overall, moving into college can be stressful. Move-in day is filled with emotions from parents and students as they move into their new dorm.

Freshman Carlie Deason from Charlotte, North Carolina explains how moving into college and adjusting was for her personally. “I was excited to move to Averett, but felt a bit overwhelmed by the adjustment I was going through,” freshman Carlie Deason said. “Thankfully I was able to make friends easily with being on the volleyball team and everyone made me feel like family instantly”. 

Although, moving in and making friends plays a big role in the adjustment process, living in dorms and sharing bathrooms and having a roommate can be a big adjustment as well.

“I enjoy living in a dorm,” Deason said. “it gives me the sense that I’m on my own and makes me feel independent.”

Feeling homesick and missing your comfort zone can play an emotional role on freshmen as they adjust for the first couple of weeks.

“I live three hours away from Averett, and can only go home when my volleyball schedule allows it,”Deason said. “But, I do often miss home and my family and friends”. 

Many of Averett’s student body comes from surrounding regions with number one being Virginia, and number two being North Carolina. Freshman Bryce Phipps is from Newport News.

“I am settling in well. I have a good amount of friends and enjoy being on the football team,” Phipps said. “My dorm is pretty small, but it is okay. Me and my roommate are good friends.”

Eating in the dining hall can also be an adjustment.

“The cafe is not bad. I expected worse but it is pretty good,” Phipps said. “My favorite is the Fried Chicken on Tuesdays”. 

Being a freshman can be scary, but with only a few months into the new school year, freshman students have positive outlooks on their own personal adjustments to college.