By Jesse Hausknecht-Brown ’25
Features Editor
“Everyday I tell myself, ‘One step at a time.’ If week one Peehu had to meet right now Peehu, she would be really proud.” Peehu Chhabra ’25
From different food to new cultural experiences to meeting new people, there are multiple aspects of adjusting to college life that can be difficult for first-year students. A new physical location, combined with an increase in social activity since the COVID-19 outbreak, has left some students feeling overwhelmed.
“It was a little daunting, because I’m going to this brand new place that I’ve never seen before,” Arianna Peña ’25 said. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Peña was not able to tour college campuses, which added stress to the adjustment process.
Peña is from Miami, Florida, and is a part of Posse, a nationwide program that partners with colleges to award full-tuition scholarships to students. All of the Posse groups at Mount Holyoke — one for each class year — consist of students from the Miami area.
“Despite having the Posse, I did come in wanting to make other friends,” Peña said. “I think in the beginning it was hard trying to make those connections with people, especially since I already had a group of people who wanted to hang out and wanted to do things. In the beginning, it was harder to try to figure out, ‘Do I hang out with these people I already know?’ Or do I try [to] make new friends?”
Assistant Dean of Studies and Class Dean for New Students, Kim Parent, stressed that first year students shouldn’t be too hard on themselves and should allow themselves time to adjust to college life.
“The whole world understands that they started college in the pandemic,” Parent explained. “If it takes them a little bit of time to figure it all out, it’s going to be okay and it’s going to be understood.”
Homesickness
For Peehu Chhabra ’25, one of the most difficult parts of the transition to college is the distance from home.
Chhabra is an international student from New Delhi, India and has been adjusting to a different culture while being thousands of miles away from where she grew up.
“For a normal American high schooler … the only transition that they have to worry about is being away from home,” Chhabra explained. “Everything else, their culture, the festivals they celebrate, the way of living that they have, is kind of the same, I would assume.”
Chhabra couldn’t have predicted the culture shock that she went through when coming to America. She described calling her mom to report all of the things she finds weird and surprising about American culture.
“The internet has normalized American culture so much that you feel like, ‘Oh, it's fine. It wouldn’t be that different.’ Well once you come here, you’re just like, ‘Woah, okay,’” Chhabra expressed. “It is like every American cultural meme combined together to form this dynamic environment which you wouldn’t expect.”
Chhabra described a feeling of being “out of touch” that is shared among international students who come from countries with different cultures and traditions. Chhabra worries about missing out on events that her friends and family in India will get to celebrate together.
“I am still here in October, and November is one of the biggest festival seasons,” Chhabra said. “And while my parents send me photos and try to keep me updated on what’s happening, I still feel like I’m missing everything that I’m supposed to be a part of.”
According to a study published in Emotion, an American Psychological Association Journal, 94 percent of first year college students report feeling homesick at some point during their first semester.
Chhabra described that breaks are difficult for her because, while other, mostly domestic, students go home during this time, she doesn’t have that option. Students like Chhabra who stay on campus during breaks see other students reuniting with their friends and families, which can lead to feelings of loneliness and homesickness. “The hardest part would, obviously, 100 percent be the fact that I am so far away from home … Any break that comes around, you’re like, ‘Oh my god,’” Chhabra said. “You dread it.”
For Chhabra, fall break felt strange — she described being surprised at how empty campus was with so many students gone. “I was sitting outside of my dorm, in the common room [which] is close to the exit. I saw a plethora of people leaving with luggage and their parents coming in and helping them,” Chhabra explained. “I was like, ‘Oh my god, I miss my home.’ I also want to go back but just don’t have the choice to actually go back.”
Given that she is from a state with a much warmer climate, Peña has also had to adapt to a new place that is geographically different from her home. “I’ll see a mountain and be like, ‘I don’t see this, I don’t get this.’ I’m actually experiencing fall for the first time ever. I’ve never had fall before,” Peña said. “I’m cold while other people aren’t. Honestly, climate wise, it’s not hard. It’s just different.”
Academics
Another challenge for first-year students is the academic adjustment. Parent explained that, because Mount Holyoke students are often high-achieving, some first-years have to get used to being in a classroom surrounded by equally high-performing students. She hears from a lot of people that the reading load is heavier than high school and they have to make adjustments to balance their workload.
“Eventually, students figure it out; they figure out how to work with texts, how to use guiding questions that teachers give, prepare for discussions, and really get through the readings,” Parent said. “They get better at it too, we always get better at things as we do it more.”
Because of the structure of Chhabra’s high school, she hadn’t taken STEM classes during the last two years of high school since she decided to do an arts focused study. Her most difficult course is neuroscience because it is, as she described it, “a step outside my comfort zone.” However, neuroscience is now one of Chhabra’s favorite classes. Additionally, due to COVID-19, she took a gap year in between high school and college and described needing to readjust, given that she had a year away from school.
Peña found that the academic transition was easier than she had expected and credits her high school International Baccalaureate program with preparing her well for the college workload.
“The workload doesn’t intimidate me as much as I thought it would,” Peña said. “[My professors are] all really transparent about what they want, what they expect from us, what to do on different tests and assignments and they’re all very helpful and they’re all willing to help, which is also something I appreciate a lot because I didn’t get a lot of it in high school.”
Community
Peña noted how coming to a predominantly white institution was a “shocker” and is a different environment from her home in Miami.
“Coming from Miami, that’s super diverse, and then meeting other people [for] who[m] this is the most diverse place they’ve ever been … It’s just so weird actually being part of the minority here, but also I’m welcoming it,” Peña said.
Peña sees this as an opportunity to teach others and is grateful that most people she talks to are willing to learn about her culture. “I have yet to meet a person who isn’t super open to learning about my culture [and] my old life back home,” Peña remarked. “And I want to learn about their stuff too.”
One thing that has made the transition easier for Chhabra is how she views the campus community as being close knit. She described talking to friends who go to larger state universities and being grateful for the smaller, more familial community that is offered at Mount Holyoke.
“It’s impossible to not see somebody you know while going out to dinner or going out to lunch,” Chhabra said. “I feel like the sense of community which our college majorly focused [on] when talking to us during orientation week, [saying], ‘Oh we’re connected.’ They did not lie about that,” Chhabra continued. “Even in my classes, my professors are so eager for us to drop in during office hours or have random conversations with us.”
Both Peña and Chhabra feel like they have lost some social skills due to the COVID-19 pandemic and notice that loss when trying to acclimate themselves to a new college social life. Parent recognized that the adjustment to college looks different this year than it has in the past because of COVID-19 and encouraged students to “forgive themselves as they adjust and give themselves time.”
Parent described how many students’ learning experience may have been different during their senior year of high school, especially if they had a parent or guardian that took a more hands-on approach.
“Now everyone’s even on their own in a different way than they were in the past. So some students, for no fault of their own, may have lost some of the independence that a lot of seniors in high school have, so they’re pulling it all together pretty quickly,” Parent said.
More first-years have been reaching out to Parent than in the past. She is a resource for new students who have questions — if she doesn’t have answers, she can point to someone who will, and can also direct students to involvement consultants who can help students find organizations to join on campus.
Chhabra described her first week at the College as being very overwhelming, as she came to America for the first time without any family and without much luggage. However, she is proud of how far she has come from the first week. “Everyday I tell myself, ‘One step at a time,’” Chhabra said. “If week one Peehu had to meet right now Peehu, she would be really proud.”