My name is Graehme Morphy, and I’m from La Canada Flintridge, California, a small suburb just outside Los Angeles. As my first year at the University of Puget Sound comes to an end, I have been given the opportunity to really look back at the beginning of my freshman year.

When I first arrived on campus at Puget Sound, it was the first day of Orientation. I had only been in Washington for one day before I had to start this whole new chapter of my life. I had never even met my roommate, so I was a little nervous at the fact that the person I would be living with for the next year of my life could be someone who was completely opposite of me and we wouldn’t get along. We met the morning of Orientation and we got along great. Lucky for me, his four best friends from high school were starting here as well. They were and still are a great group of friends I’ve really clicked with.

Those first couple days of school are filled with introductions, learning new names, and playing many games. The university sets up a huge welcome program that really enables every freshman to feel at home at the school and to meet a ton of people. You’ll learn that a doorstop is one of the best buys you will make the whole year and your door is always open. Orientation is split up into two sections: Prelude/Perspectives and Passages. While one half of the freshman class is in Prelude/Perspectives, the other half is on Passages, and then they switch. 

Prelude/Perspectives is the section of Orientation where students go through activities in Tacoma to introduce everyone to the city, and we take a day class to understand the standards of the university and professors alike. Urban Plunge was one of the big activities we did during the week. It was a day-long volunteer project in which you and your Perspectives group go to a site in Tacoma to help the city. My group went to an AIDS house nearby and helped clean up. It was so much fun and really allowed me to get close to other kids in my group. I met some of my best friends on that day and those ensuing. This was also the chance to meet with our academic advisor and plan out our schedules for the coming semester. It’s a great opportunity to get insight from your peer advisor and your academic advisor.

Prelude is the day during Orientation in which you take a day-long class of your choice. While it sounds like a long day, it honestly is a great opportunity to meet a professor and new friends who are in the same boat as you. During this time you really get the chance to get know the campus and Tacoma as a whole. You will find yourself making daily trips to Target, meeting new people and listening to really great speakers who talk about alcohol, diversity, and just about anything you could think of. Also you see skits and go to activities like Root Beer Float Night and a dance, all that are put on by the Perspectives leaders.

The second part of Orientation for me was the Passages program. This is when we traveled to a camp about two hours away on the Puget Sound. Immediately you are welcomed by all the Passages leaders and are divided into your groups. I was in the canoe day trip group. The whole trip was so much fun. During the day, we would hang out on the pier and jump off the end into the water. Not only did we canoe, but we sailed and had a free-choice day, as well. There are so many options for people to partake in, and I think that’s what made the trip so much fun. This is also another time to really get to know people. You get the choice of where you want to sleep and you take a group of friends and go to the pier or the field for the night and sleep under the stars. All in all, the trip was really memorable.

The beginning of freshman year really was a time in my life that will stand out distinctly. Starting classes wasn’t really nerve-racking because of the comfort I felt from the events of the previous week. Prelude allowed me to adjust to Puget Sound, Passages allowed me to adjust to the Pacific Northwest, and Perspectives really allowed me to adjust to Tacoma. After this Orientation to the university and a lot of new friends, I am now an elected member of ASUPS Senate, sitting on two standing committees, a subcommittee chair for Relay for Life, and pledge class president of my fraternity, Phi Delta Theta. I believe that this has all happened because of all the opportunities available at Puget Sound and the confidence I gained during those first weeks of school.