Best wishes to all UChicago students starting their first day of classes today. It’s been a REALLY long summer for my first year, while she idly watched her friends at other colleges get into their groove over a month ago.
She texted me early this morning after jumping into Lake Michigan with her House - apparently a tradition to kick off the school year. She is so excited to be a part of the UChicago community and to finally get this show on the road.
A plus that it’s unseasonably warm here in Chicago this morning! Good luck to her, I am sure she will be in her own groove in no time at all.
I agree, the summer between HS graduation (May 12 for us) and UChicago first day of classes is the longest summer ever! Next summer, she will probably be doing something cool in another city for the summer and only be home for a few weeks like my DD. ?
Congratulations and good luck to your DD. Such an exciting time!!
Class of 2023 is 1,800 strong? That is more than I expect. Kudos to the kids doing civic engagement.
Yes, kudos to the volunteers at UChicago, they look so wonderful. Also, so glad that the behemoth located in Hyde Park, UChicago, has made a decision years ago to engage in their neighborhood.
Hope everyone had a great first day of class and also have a wonderful upcoming year. From my son’s experience last year as a freshman, I hear that the first quarter was very stressful especially if taking hum and sosc simultaneously. Adding to some of the stress is the applying for the rsos, reading stuff you don’t understand (yet), etc. but it will definitely get better.
My son is doing the Hum/Sosc and says that so far it’s been “fun.” First week.
@85bears46 - not sure that # is correct. We haven’t been hearing the “doubles in I-House” complaints of last year when the numbers actually WERE 1800 strong. Plus, the latest count of Hum shows about 1760-something. A small handful of those (fewer than 10 at last count) were Class of '22 members (re) taking. Didn’t notice them having to expand capacity in the core courses, although that might be due to offering more sections of everything. Sanderson’s 100 was apparently PACKED today with dozens of students (one person thought it was as many as 100) hoping to get into the class but not sure what that demonstrates, other than enthusiasm for Bus. Econ. - or that first years are no longer packing their schedules with 100% Core like they used to - have they no respect for tradition? 
I saw the pictures on the FB page of the kiddos in the lake. They look like they had a blast. My daughter’s house did not participate in that activity, and she is rather thankful. She’s been going to bed really, really late for the past week and a half, and a 6:00 wake up would have been horrible. Seems to like her classes now that she’s been to all 4 of them. She’s got quite a hike from one end of the campus to the other with only ten minutes to get there, but the professor seems to be pretty understanding of the situation. Wishing your kids lots of success and great new experiences.
@85bear46 at #3: did they edit that number in the article? Check it out again
@JBStillFlying Hmm, does that means the College news people actually check out CC 
?
^ Or Reddit because the same question was posted there.
@JBStillFlying What are the “doubles in I-House complaints?” maybe I can oblige! Ha!Ha!
Last year a few of the first years in I-House were actually in double-occupancy rooms (which were larger than the standard single room, btw), complete with room mate. Not sure that had happened before. But the class size was a good 50+ more than they had expected so something had to be done.
Are you aware of double occupancy occurring this year at I-House?
Don’t know about I-house doubles, but I know of an incoming frosh who took an unplanned gap year after getting overflow housing, evidently somewhere close to Science and Industry Museum (info directly from a parent, who didn’t know the name of the residence hall/apartment complex)…that is the first I have heard of any overflow housing situation.
That would be Stony Island. This will be its last year.
Edit to add that technically Stony isn’t overflow. It’s just a ways off campus so probably a pretty unpopular option.
Edit again to add that this student would likely have had first dibs at WRC had he/she remained.
Thanks @JBStillFlying She will be at UC next year, just deferred for a year because of disappointment with housing, per parent…don’t know if there could have also been something else going on…
@JBStillFlying I think there are some/a few doubles in I-House this year.
Across the hall from my son, two boys are sharing what looks to be rooms with an interconnecting door. There are also a few others who either have the same set-up or are sharing a single room. I know of two girls in Thompson sharing a room that does not look any larger than my S’s single.
^ Wow. Seriously? While the interconnecting rooms are like those at BJ (so yeah, “doubles” but more like a two-room suite), the information about two beds in a space small enough for a single seems odd. How do they even fit the other desk in there?
Here’s a glimpse of a first-day-of-classes for a 4th year UChicago student:
https://www.insider.com/university-of-chicago-first-day-classes-student-2019-10