Tag Archives: Wesleying Unofficial Orientation Series

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Unofficial Orientation Series 2018: First Year Classes

This is an update of wilk‘s update of Jackson‘s post from 2015, which was an update of skorn‘s post from 2014. Which was an update of DaPope‘s post from 2013. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, or some shit like that, right?

This is going to be a very familiar webpage for the next four years… use it wisely.

This is part of our 2018 Unofficial Orientation Series. A quick reminder that you can check out the welcome post here and past years’ series here.

I’m 99% sure you are brimming with excitement right now, dear young frosh — and you can’t wait to completely settle in on campus, and hopefully, you’re finding that orientation is pretty fun. You should be excited. There are also parties. And people. Ya gotta like the people.

But, of course, part of being interested in Wesleyan means also being interested in the classes that you will take at Wesleyan, and as a Real Life Wesleyan Student, there is a slight chance I can help you on that front.

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Unofficial Orientation 2018: Rage Update

Wes is known for its history of activism. Rage update outlines all public activism that occurred on campus in the past academic year. It seems to have become an every other year sort of thing for us with our first article in 2014, our second in 2016, and now our third in 2018. All articles are definitely worth a read and although 2017 didn’t get an article, it was certainly a year worth remembering so I’ll leave some links to further reading in the end.

Rage update wouldn’t be complete without the words of alt, the author of our first rage update:

You’ve now arrived on campus, and we hope that you find your time here enriching and transformative. In that hope, we feel that it would be ill-advised to allow you to not have at least a foundational understanding of the things that have forced us as a community into dialogue, disagreement, and action.

This is not to scare you or to give you a negative impression of the University. However, we are certain that most if not all of you were told about the “passion” that Wesleyan students have and the issues that we care about on campus are at the forefront of those passions. While there is certainly no requirement to take an activist stance on any of these issues and it is in fact easy to sink beneath the radar on these issues and all the others not covered here, we would plead with you to be engaged in the community that you are now a part of.

Read this, ask questions, and reach out to students and faculty that have been here before you. We hope that as you begin your time here, you fully invest yourself as a community member committed to making Wesleyan as good as it can be for you and for those after you. Caring about Wesleyan does not foreclose critique on Wesleyan and as you read this, and other things like it, we hope you understand that too.

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Unofficial Orientation 2018: Greek Life

“I mean, I studied abroad in Athens. Is that what you mean by Greek Life?”

This is sdz‘s update of wilk‘s update from 2016 as part of our 2018 Unofficial Orientation Series. A quick reminder that you can check out our welcome post here and past years’ series here.

So this article is gonna be interesting. It includes an aggregation of updates from both 2016-2017 and 2017-2018. Both years included some pretty pivotal Greek Life related things that you probably wanna know about. Some of you may be surprised that we even have Greek life (apparently other lib arts schools don’t?). Others might have already delved into our storied Greek Life related past. Are we about to tell you that Wes Greek Life is back to its prime? No. But there’s some new stuff here that you’re probably gonna wanna know, so it’s probably best that you hit the jump.

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Unofficial Orientation Series 2016: Official Orientation 101

Congratulations! You have made it through the rigors of Unofficial Orientation with your good friends here at Wesleying! Now, for your final challenge before you are officially Wesleyan students: ~Official~ Orientation.

Orientation is a wild time. You are left to your own devices without classes/activities/parents to structure your time. There are “mandatory,” highly-recommended, and optional sessions. There are the parties you hear about people going to, but have no idea how to find. There are those first awkward meals with your hallmates/roommates. There are the nights when you curl up in bed with a picture of your best friends from high school and wonder why you didn’t just follow them to college.

Our goal today is to teach you everything you need to know in order to make the most out of your orientation experience and start the year off on a good foot!

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Unofficial Orientation Series 2016: First Year Classes

This is an update of Jackson‘s post from 2015, which was an update of skorn‘s post from 2014. Which was an update of DaPope‘s post from 2013. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, or some shit like that, right?

This is going to be a very familiar webpage for the next four years… use it wisely.

This is part of our 2016 Unofficial Orientation Series. A quick reminder that you can check out the welcome post here and past years’ series here.

I’m 99% sure you are brimming with excitement right now, dear young frosh — and you can’t wait to finally be on campus to settle in, and finally be a college student. (BTW, orientation is pretty fun. You should be excited. There are also parties. And people. Ya gotta like the people.) But, of course, part of being interested in Wesleyan means also being interested in the classes that you will take at Wesleyan, and as a Real Life Wesleyan Student, there is a slight chance I can help you on that front.

Continue reading →

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[UPDATED] Unofficial Orientation Series 2016: Middletown Eating

This post is a ~fresh update~ of astag_rocky‘s repost of a repost of a repost. Please note: this is by no means an exhaustive list of eating options in Middletown, as this perfunctory Yelp search will show you. Feel free to add your own recommendations in the comments.

Middletown has so many fantastic dining options that at first you might feel like this turtle: faced with an almost insurmountable mountain of deliciousness. Much like the above turtle, though, you’ve got to start somewhere. We’re here to give you a head start.

From coffee-shop casual to awkward-family-dinner upscale, there’s food in Middletown for every occasion. This is Part 1 of our guide to some of the best places to eat in town, to be continued tomorrow. Prices are on a $ to $$$ scale. Also worth noting is that a lot of Middletown restaurants accept Middletown cash, so save up some of that laundry money for your dining excursions. Read all of our food list after the jump!

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Unofficial Orientation Series 2016: Eating and Drinking at Wes

This post is an updated version of the Eating and Drinking installment of last year’s Orientation Series.

This is part of our 2016 Unofficial Orientation Series. A quick reminder that you can check out the welcome post here and past years’ series here.

Eating and drinking is a necessity for all living beings, even during your hazy college days. While we all have to adjust our food standards from delicious home-cooked meals to university food, trust me, it could be worse. Wesleyan has many options for dining that you can enjoy regardless of your dietary orientation. Although we were only ranked #9 for Most Vegan-Friendly Colleges, we still have awesome vegan food and our friends at the Mongolian Grill are always willing to cook up a chicken tortilla topped with cheese if it’s protein that you want.

This is a part of the Unofficial Orientation Series 2016 to remind you to eat your veggies.

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Unofficial Orientation 2016: How to Keep Wes Green

This will be mostly a repost of Samira‘s two updates of DMZ‘s original 2012 post but with some important updates, so read on, dear freshies.

Is there anything more romantic than a bike ride in place? (October 2012)

This is part of our 2016 Unofficial Orientation Series. A quick reminder that you can check out the welcome post here and past years’ series here.

If you came to Wesleyan because of some vague, or obvious, interest in environmentalism, then you’re in luck! If you find the right people, organizations, classes, etc. then you’ll have a great support system for keeping green on campus. If you thought it was impressive that the admissions building has solar panels on top of it (mostly a ploy to get environmentalist students to apply), then you’ll have a great time getting involved with sustainability efforts at Wes.

First of all, Wesleyan has a sustainability coordinator, whose role is to help further Wesleyan’s mission of sustainability, including making things clearer to you. Her name is Jen Kleindienst and you can send her an email at jkleindienst(at)wes. For any and all questions regarding sustainability, you should also check out Wesleyan’s sustainability website. (I’ll be going through the most important details, but I can’t link to everything.)

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Unofficial Orientation Series 2016: Middletown Outings

This is part of our 2016 Unofficial Orientation Series. A quick reminder that you can check out the welcome post here and past years’ series here.

Toto, we’re not in Bushwick anymore. You’ve now left the comfort of deep Brooklyn, as they call it, for the not-so-dissimilar milieu of Wesleyan. Just kidding, a vast majority of Weskids are from not-Brooklyn, not-LA, and not-Bay-Area, although it might seem otherwise.

For all of you from those (wonderful) places, and all of you from other places, Middletown is different than those places (shocking!). It was once the largest city in Connecticut, circa pre-war-of-1812. Can your hometown claim that title? Nah. Unless you’re from Middletown, in which case you are probably way more qualified than me to write this post.

While Wesleyan is fine and there is usually never a shortage of things to do on campus, Middletown and the surrounding area truly have some wonderful gems that are worth knowing about as you settle in and look for things to do other than vape on Foss. Here is wesleying’s (my) attempt at travel blogging. Bring your fanny pack:

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Unofficial Orientation Series 2016: Rage Update

Students march to South College as part of ISTHISWHY Campaign

Content warning: This article discusses issues of sexual assault. Community and official support resources can be accessed here, here, and here.

This is part of our 2016 Unofficial Orientation Series. A quick reminder that you can check out the welcome post here and past years’ series here.

For some reason, this post was not included in last year’s Unofficial Orientation Series, even though we had some major student activism occurring during the 2014-2015 school year. Before I link to some of that history and go more in-depth as to some actions occurring this past year, I want to start by quoting alt‘s incredibly well-written intro to the 2014 Rage Update:

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