Tips for Incoming Freshman During Quarantine

5/27/2020


There is a lot of uncertainty about the coming months, but if you’re anything like me, you’re just trying to take it day by day. I can’t imagine how incoming freshmen are feeling right now, but I do know that you have been given a gift of time. There are a few things I recommend doing during this quarantine to prepare for your fall semester and hopefully build excitement for what should be an exciting time!

Make a headboard for your dorm room
Crafting has been a huge trend during quarantine, so why not work on a project you can enjoy all year? I made my own headboard for my freshman year dorm and junior year sorority house room. You can read my post here.

Shop the sales
I’m all about shopping the sales, and right now there are some you can shop for things you’ll likely need in your dorm room. The Container Store, Target and Pottery Barn have been running consistent sales recently and will likely have more specials throughout the summer. It may help to purchase some necessary items like a laundry bin and desk hutch while everything is still in stock — you get to pick what you like! Here are items from The Container Store I use in my room at school.

Set up labels in your school email
My life would have been much easier freshman year if I had started organizing my inbox earlier! As a college student, you will get a lot of emails. Whether it’s from professors about classes, the university or any organization, you’ll likely want a system to keep everything organized. I know classes have not started and you have not joined any organizations yet, but I recommend going ahead and making labels for the classes you register for now so you’re ready when emails start to flow in on that first week. I like to color code my labels using the same colors as my planner too.

Map out your room
For me, this was one of the most exciting parts about moving in to the dorm! My mom found the dimensions of my dorm room on the university’s housing website. We used that to make a smaller scale drawing and played around with different layouts of my bed, desk, bedside table, rug and cubby storage. This made move-in day much easier knowing where everything was going and that each item I brought had a place. I did this with my junior year room too and it saves so much time and energy of moving things around.

Start deciding which clothes you’d like to bring
This is always the part of the packing process that takes me the longest. You won’t need all your clothes at school and will likely want some new clothes when you get there. It may seem early, but take a look in your closet and maybe start putting things to the side if you don’t think you’ll want it at school. You may even find some clothes that can be donated in the process!

I know this is a challenging time with so much uncertainty, but I hope this gives you a bit of inspiration to build some excitement toward this fall. With some extra time on your hands, hopefully these tasks will make the move to college a bit easier. 

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