Grad Camp '10!

After months of preparation, I spent the last two days at Grad Camp. Grad Camp is an overnight orientation for incoming graduate students designed to teach them about life at A&M and have fun meeting new people in the process. I applied in April and was lucky enough to get chosen to be a counselor- between my campus leadership experience, my 7 years at A&M, and my generally perky personality, it was a good fit. After three planning sessions and some outside preparation, Thursday and Friday was finally camp.

Grad Camp went exactly as planned- no major injuries, accident, or incidents. In fact, the only time the medic was needed was two hours before departure when I got a surface cut that happened to be on top of a scar (which just meant it looked worse than it was), so he got to help me clean and Band-Aid it :) Everyone was great, and if anyone didn't get along I didn't know about it. We were divided into smaller discussion groups so we could get to know each other better, and my group (Go Team Red!) was probably the more laid back of the three, but everyone had fascinating stories and it was neat to learn so much about people in such a short amount of time.

So, what does one do at Grad Camp? Well, I won't do a play-by-play, but some highlights are good. Campers arrived Thursday morning, and as the more experienced Aggie (as in I did undergrad here too) I led people around the displays at the alumni building and introduced them to some Aggie traditions. We went to camp at at retreat center outside of town, and after we unpacked we went to lunch. We had our first time with our groups to get to know each other, then listened to speakers from groups around campus, and spent more time with our groups. After an inter-group skit contest (we lost), we had dinner, then taught the campers the yells they will use at sporting events (again, being the experienced one I did a lot of the leading, which was so fun!). At night we had a mixer, where I danced and hula-ed and played cards and Jenga-ed. The next day we had more speakers and group time (and we won a group contest, for our group yell- ruh ruh ruh ruh, eh eh eh eh, duh duh duh duh!), and after lunch we had free time to hang out and have fun with our new friends. This time mostly consisted of people swimming, getting hit by water balloons, and people who didn't want to get wet being dragged into the water anyway. We ended the day by eating, packing, talking, and exchanging contact information. There will be many gatherings after this, both to introduce campers to Aggie traditions and events and just to hang out.

So Grad Camp was a resounding success. Not only did I share my love for Aggieland with new students, I now have around 45 new friends that I can't wait to see again. It was definitely worth all of the work. Whoop!