<p>DD is our 2nd child to go to college, and we have learned with our eldest that there are "DOWN TIMES" where the traffic is less congested. We have a 3+ hr travel time, would it be best to leave O Dark Thirty, thus being there as soon as possible, or leave later and it do it at the tail end?</p>
<p>If it works our DD has already asked for a specific roommate, thus fighting over a bed is no biggie!</p>
<p>Have to say I am dreading move in just from a logistics standpoint!</p>
<p>I think there’s a limit to how early you can check in, so keep that in mind. Tech is a HUGE school and I’m sure plenty of people will be there at the first chance. Depending on your dorm (I know Washington street was this way) there should probably be student organizations outside ready and able to carry stuff up with you. Please be kind and have things organized and ready to just grab (bags ideal) and carry up.</p>
<p>I may be wrong, but I don’t anticipate any real down times. It’s going to take a pretty good amount of time, and by the end most parents won’t want it to be over if you know what I mean. Take your time, don’t stress out, and enjoy the experience; it’s the last time you’ll (probably) see your son/daughter for a few months :-)</p>
<p>Tech isn’t letting us do greek move in next year, so chances are moving in will be a much bigger hassle than normal. In my experience moving people in you have a temporary “30 minute” pass with which you can park on the side of washington street and unload all you stuff. Thats typically when a student org will offer to help carry stuff in, but with no greeks helping thats hundreds of less helpers.</p>
<p>why exactly are they not allowing the greeks to help?</p>
<p>Really I don’t think not having the frats/sororities involved makes a huge difference. We had a ton of stuff the first year (freshmen always overpack!) and with 3 of us made out fine, parked on Washington St. and had everything off the sidewalk in about 20 minutes. We have seen some groups helping, but we have also seen some spending a lot of time eating the free snowcones …maybe they were Greek? 
Who knows…but you can do OK if you plan. Two words: Hand Truck. Preferably the ones with the four wheels and flatbed. We went ahead and bought one as we figured with the two kids it would get its use for awhile. If not, just ask neighbors or even at your local schools, some of them will let you borrow them for a couple of days. Good luck!</p>
<p>I know that the football team helped with move in last year too.hah</p>
<p>I’m not sure the exact reason, but I can almost guarantee it’s because of the recruitment aspect of it. More so for fraternities than sororities, but move in is a huge recruitment tool to get people who would never think about going greek to try it… And of course the best recruitment event before rush, which is 3 weeks into school, is parties during that week (August 20-25) where there’s no classes and 5500 freshmen. And judging by the rest of the school, about 4500 of them will be trying to go party all that week. </p>
<p>The University has really been cracking down on greek life’s social aspect during the last 2 years. 5 fraternities and 1 sorority got kicked off campus this past year, which is a ridiculous amount compared to other years. So going back to the original topic, the school is against greeks partying and is trying to stop freshmen from going to “frat” parties, even though they’ll find apartment parties just as easily.</p>
<p>The football team only helps out because there required too, and they just sit there most of the time talking to themselves like they do all year…</p>
<p>Are the parties restrictive? Do you have to know people or pay money or something to get in? What about the Radford parties?</p>
<p>You should have no problem finding a party. You can usually get into parties for free if you know someone, otherwise you’ll likely have to pay the standard $5 (this may be different for females). You can go over to Radford for parties if you want to, but it’s not as if there’s an absence of parties in the Blacksburg area.</p>
<p>I was an RA for 2 years and remember doing move in very well. Move in usually starts around 8am and goes until 6pm and you usually walk in the front door of whatever dorm your assigned to. The RA’s will help you out (or should) and explain everything. Make sure you have your student ID to show them so they can find your keys and everything. You get a 30 minute parking pass for free but pay attention to time because Virginia Tech will ticket you the moment they can. Dorm rooms are tiny if you haven’t seen them already, in some buildings the end ones are larger so you could get lucky. </p>
<p>back in my freshman year (06) we’d just go party hopping which usually started by going to a party we heard of (from so and so or from class) and go to that and if it was too crowded or didn’t pan out we’d go to the next nearest one. I’m not even kidding, on Friday and Saturday nights, those first few weeks if you go to a party you can hear the next nearest party too, which is how party hopping works. </p>
<p>I’ve been living in the apartments for a year now and every weekend I hear some sort of party. I’ve been to a lot of greek parties and while you often have to pay, they also are a lot more fun, however those stop once rush begins unless you are rushing. I chose not to do greek because it’s too expensive and I can make friends doing clubs and other academic related activities for free.</p>
<p>I’m not really into ‘that kind’ of partying…but heads up to freshmen and other students: there will be undercover cops around campus (primarily around D2) more than you’d think for the first few weeks. They’ll just sit there lurking and waiting for someone to trip or exhibit the other symptoms of someone who’s wasted and then BAM it’s a citation or worse :-)</p>
<p>But if you’re going to be stupid, then you deserve it. You only get one chance to make a good start at school; however, that’s not to say don’t have any fun!</p>
<p>Especially don’t go to DX after a party if you’re wasted. Cops hang out there from ~11 ro 12 to closing (2:00AM).</p>
<p>yeah that’s true, when I was an RA in training, we had a lot of cops talk to us about their experiences as part of the training and they always tell us how to get “drunk” and not get caught. </p>
<p>Basically they say guys get caught way more than girls because girls always travel in groups and guys are prone to walk home alone and drunk or get caught peeing in public and being dumb. </p>
<p>Being a lone target makes it easy for a cop to pull to the side and arrest ect. vs being in a group.</p>
<p>So if you are going to be dumb and stupid and drink underage, travel in groups and at least have a sober leader taking you back to campus preferably near your building. </p>
<p>Also as an RA, I only wrote drunk students up if they were causing severe ruckus or vandalism at 2+AM in the morning OR they were puking in which RA’s have to call the ambulance for possible alcohol poisoning no exception and the police always show with the ambulance.</p>
<p>However there are some RA’s on a power trip (including seveal of my co workers at the time) and would go “seeking” those types of students. I was usually just trying to sleep. </p>
<p>So try to get to know your RA well if your planning on partying.</p>
<p>speaking of the whole ‘leader’ thing: knew a guy who made it back to his dorm and got a call from a girl he knew who said she wanted someone to walk her back to campus. Guy leaves his dorm, goes across campus to walk her back, and gets busted by a UC cop! He had been drinking earlier, but still that sucks!</p>
<p>Travel in groups and cops harass you a lot less. Don’t make a habit of DX after drinking when returning to campus due to it’s effect on your meal plan balance and waist, but sometimes you just gotta have those chicken fingers…</p>
<p>Don’t get the pizza though. Stuff’s nasty.</p>
<p>Like everywhere, 90% of the cops are just genuinely cool. As long as you aren’t hurting yourself or anyone else they’ll let you go/will bust a party but not write tickets/etc. ~9% are complete jerks but technically they are well within legal rights to convict you, arrest you whatever,etc. they just go ridiculously out of their way. Then there’s a few that should probably be fired.</p>
<p>I unfortunately know from experience, but the courts are so backed up that if you get some minor infraction, 3rd class misdemeanor or below, 25 hours of community service gets it dropped the first time around 100%. Looking back, mine is actually pretty funny because my parents we literally coming up the next morning for a game, but anyway…</p>
<p>Basically, know the difference between being a drunk-*$$ and having a good time and you’ll be fine.</p>
<p>Yeah, I lived a pretty… active life, both on campus and off and never had a problem with the police. A few parties got busted and a couple times the people that lived there got fined, but I never saw someone get arrested unless they were fighting or something. Start off slow (it’s the kids that’ve never had alcohol and then get plastered their first week that get in trouble) and figure out how much you can drink before you become unable to semi-intelligently make it home and you’ll be fine.</p>