<p>DS has arrived at BWI to head to College Park for orientation. I am so frustrated right now!! UMD’s website provided directions for the MARC from BWI to College Park, but they don’t go to College Park!! He said he just bought a ticket to D.C. and then I guess take a bus to College Park. I know he’s a big boy and he’s not the one stressing, but I just wish the info had been more accurate.</p>
<p>Jewels - where did you get the info on transportation? Anyone know the best route from BWI to CP? And how long does it take to get there, what’s the cost, and where does it drop off (assuming we will have luggage) ??</p>
<p>You definitely should double check this because I’m not sure and have never done it, but there seems to be a bus (B30 according to one site) from BWI, which will take you all the way to the Greenbelt metro station, which is the northernmost on the Green line, the UMD stop is the next stop after that. So you can just take the metro a single stop, or not at all depending on if you’re staying at a hotel off campus.</p>
<p>I would recheck that though. (The bus part. The metro part I am sure of)</p>
<p>Well after almost 3 hours, he made it. The website seems to be wrong or just not worded accurately. Basically from BWI you CAN take a MARC, but it says to take the MARC from BWI Rail Station. That’s not correct. You have to take a shuttle from BWI to the Camden MARC Rail Statio (not BWI Rail Station). There is a direct train to College Park from Camden and ONLY Camden Rail Station. It also only comes at certain times, so even if DS would have taken the shuttle all the way back to BWI airport, then gotten on the right shuttle to Camden, he still would have had to wait 2 hours for the direct train. From there it would have been a very short bus ride to UMD once in College Park.</p>
<p>He got shoved and signed at on this mode of transportation and I had to laugh out loud when he said, “Mom, I’m not in Texas anymore!” The funny thing is that they were women doing the shoving and shouting!! It’s going to take some better planning now that we now which rail station to take from BWI and it will be better next time.</p>
<p>He texted later to say that it is like a hurricane there right now complete with flooding and “rain by the buckets”.</p>
<p>The cost btw for the MARC was $16.00 from BWI to D.C., then a couple of bucks on the Metro to CP. He could have taken the MARC into D.C. for $6.00 if he were willing to wait another hour, but he wasn’t willin’.</p>
<p>Oh my…it sounds so confusing…how much is a taxi from BWI to CP?</p>
<p>Well, if the UMD website is correct on that, it says $50.00. I know the Super Shuttle was $29.00 last time he went and I am sending one to pick him up tomorrow too. The only problem with that is that you have to wait at BWI until the van is full and then they start dropping off all over town. I guess CP is the furthest because last time DS was the last to be dropped off. Going to the airport, he was the first to be picked up, then had to drive around town to pick everyone else up to fill the van. That was why he tried the MARC this time around. He spent the same amount of time almost on both, but there was less drama on the Super Shuttle for the most part. </p>
<p>I wonder if things would be different/easier if he flew in to DCA. </p>
<p>I’m really not sure what the best method of transportation would be. I guess for comfort, it would be a Town Car or a cab, but it would cost at least the $50.00 each way. I guess I will let him decide. I can tell you that when I go up with him in August, it will be an air conditioned cab/car.</p>
<p>Yes, flying into National would be much simpler (though the fares may be higher). You can get to College Park directly from there on Metro with just one transfer to the Green Line:</p>
<p>[Metro</a> Rail Map](<a href=“http://www.wmata.com/rail/maps/map.cfm]Metro”>http://www.wmata.com/rail/maps/map.cfm)</p>
<p>Thanks Terp80. Even if the fare is higher, in the end it may work out the same with the Super Shuttle expense etc. I will look into that for next time.</p>
<p>I will update later on orientation. I know DS said this morning that they were not actually registering until the second day of their orientation.</p>
<p>It’s a little bit late, but…</p>
<p>@ astro
Orientation was pretty good. It seemed the Orientation Advisors, or OAs, prepared carefully for the orientation. I didn’t like the schedule, though. There were many breaks and we basically had nothing to do. There were several activities at night, and we could either participate or just go to sleep. The activities were: knowing about Greek Life, movie (this one was cancelled 
), board games, and Wii (yeah!).</p>
<p>Also, for students, make sure to bring a sleeping bag. The bed you will get is just a hard mattress . There’s no sheets or anything. My roommate didn’t bring his sleeping bag, so suffered from a pain on his back :P</p>
<p>@ Jewels,
The registration went pretty smoothly. We had an hour and half to finish, but everyone finished in about thirty minutes.
Also, about the immunization records, they collect the records at the very beginning of the orientation. I sent my immunization records two months ago, so I didn’t have to deal with it.
OAs never mentioned anything about the insurance card, deposit, and meal plan change. I guess everyone at the orientation had already taken care of.</p>
<p>DS finished with registration pretty quickly. His advisor was from TEXAS too!! There were about 200 H students at this orientation. They told DS that the next orientation scheduled has 1800 students!! That must be half of the freshman class! He’s glad he attended the first Honors orientation and it’s behind him. He’s excited about the courses. I was surprised to learn he will be taking two sciences his first semester and a lab. He ended up with 16 hours. I was hoping he would take a little less and test the waters, but he has always liked diving in head first. Why would I think this would be any different?</p>
<p>He met lots of great people. Many he clicked with were from Maryland. He noticed a very LARGE Jewish population of students. Several said they chose UMD because of this. I had no idea. We don’t see that very much in Texas.</p>
<p>@ Freethinker,</p>
<p>The direct deposit and meal plan are little things he needed to do as a B/K Scholarship recipient. He hand-delivered the immunization record and we will need to fax his proof of health insurance to the pharmacy and one other place. All UMD students are required to show proof of health insurance coverage.</p>
<p>There’s definitely a bus to Greenbelt metro station (one stop away from CP on the metro) from BWI which runs fairly frequently. I use it to get to DC from the boonies :).</p>
<p>But I don’t deny that public transportation can be frustrating and confusing. Though if your son navigated from BWI to College Park eventually, he’s well prepared for city life :P.</p>
<p>Orientation update from D’s dates on June 22-23…</p>
<p>I apologize to all of you will get the rain or hot/humid days when you’re at UMD this summer. We scored the absolute best weather MD can offer this time of year!!!</p>
<p>Everything went smoothly, D enjoyed herself, and is happy with her schedule.
She did better than expected by any of us on her math placement, and although she swore that she was not planning to take math OR an 8:00 a.m. class her first semester freshman year, she is in — you guessed it ---- an 8:00 a.m. Math 140 calculus class!!!
(her advisor convinced her to take math, so that she wouldn’t be slowed down on taking some future classes in the next couple of semesters for her major, and checking ourUMD.com on the potential math profs convinced her of the 8:00 a.m. time). She’s getting up at 6:45 a.m. all summer because of her summer internship, so I’m trying to convince her it won’t be that bad (provided, of course, that she can get herself to bed before 2:00 a.m., or count on taking daily naps)…</p>
<p>At the orientation, many of the parents were really surprised that they were separated from their kids from the very beginning on day 1. I assume that all the cc’ers have gone to the effort to look at the schedule, and know what to expect, but there were LOTS of people who clearly were surprised. And many of the parent questions asked were kind of scary: “Can I check online to see my kid’s attendance in class?”, and indicates that they aren’t quite ready for this…btw, the answer is NO!</p>
<p>We attended orientation, mainly because we had to make the 7+ hr drive to take her up to UMD, and also didn’t want her to think we weren’t as “interested” as we were when her sister went through this 2 yrs. ago. I’ll admit that we skipped out on a few of the parent sections and took advantage of being outside on a beautiful day, since we’ve been-there-done-that. However, the program was well-run, stayed mostly on schedule, and the sessions lead by Faculty members (the one on advising first thing in the a.m. and the last one of the day when the parents/kids are rejoined) were particularly interesting, and the student panel discussion is always good. It is a down-load of a lot of information, but as long as you realize that you can find the answers to most of your questions online, via testudo.umd.edu and umd.edu , it starts to make the idea that your kid really IS a college student now starts to sink in.</p>
<p>D2 had done lots of looking/planning/dreaming/reading online on the UMD sites before she went. With her sister’s tips, she was probably at a much bigger advantage as far as “getting” the concepts of registration, but she said that lots of people were just kind of glassy-eyed at the info-download and hadn’t remotely looked or thought about the classes they might want to take for the fall. Best recommendation I can give is to make sure they’ve looked at the requirements for their proposed major, looked at the CORE requirements and know what areas they will have to take classes in to meet those CORE requirements. They should have their directory ID and password set up, and take the math placement test before they go, as well as read online to understand what the options/placement process for math is. While not required, it sure helps for the student to come in prepared!</p>
<p>Re: clothing…She left with 3 free t-shirts (2 from bookstores, one because of College Park Scholars)…don’t need to get too hung up on what your kid takes to wear! D was one of the few who brought something in addition to flip-flops to wear, because she knew she’d be doing a lot of walking</p>
<p>Re: dorm…they stay at Cumberland (with AC!!!); room assignments are made after all the presentations are done…the bags, sleeping bags or sheets and pillows stay in the
car all day until check-in. Kids can request roommates (if they know someone they want to stay with, or someone they’ve met during the day). Otherwise, the kids are divided by gender, and are just assigned rooms/roommates sequentially…D’s roommate was the girl in front of her in line. </p>
<p>In a “welcome to college” moment, the Roommate left the room shortly after dumping her stuff off, and didn’t return until 6:30 a.m… hmmm. “x” off that bff possiblity, haha!! D did meet several people, and enjoyed who she hung out with. At the evening activity, she joined the group that did the climbing wall, and returned after they’d announced the next locations for activities, so she wandered around and joined a group. (said that most of the guys hung out in boy-posse’s and either played sports or watched sports on TV!!!). Knowing my D would only enhance the irony in this, but she happened to join the “greek life” presentation. (um, NOT the sorority type. uh…no). But hey, she just had to watch a 12-minute video and then got FREE water ice, so it was worth it, she said!!! They played games outside (happened to be Apples 2 Apples), and she enjoyed herself, and it was a welcome relief from all the info download they had on the first day. She was ready to go a little after 2, and she slept nearly the entire way (7+ hrs) home.</p>
<p>BTW, we stayed at the Holiday Inn in Greenbelt (have been there before), a very nice place in office park area , with more pleasant surroundings than any of the choices on Rt. 1. We opted out of any of the parent trips, and took advantage of the opportunity to sleep in, and then had lunch with our older D for lunch, (who we also hung out with on Monday night). We drove up on Sunday, and took in a Nationals baseball game for Father’s Day with both kids…bad team, awesome ballpark.</p>
<p>It was a good trip; if you aren’t planning to attend with your kid, it’s OK, especially if you’ve been a cc regular and asked a lot of qustions, and spent time on the umd sites. It’s certainly a program to make the kids get used to the idea that hey! they really are going to be College Students!!! When I went through this before, it was reassuring to me to have a better idea of what my D was going to be going through.</p>
<p>Astrophysicsmom…thanks for the information. It’s just what I need to get my DS thinking about his orientation trip next month. I have a question…S is going into the B.Arch program but since his NROTC scholarship transferred, he can only major in Architectural Engineering or Architectural Engineering Technology. Do they address changing majors or the ‘design it yourself’ major option during orientation or should he do something about changing his major before he gets to orientation. He’s considering Civil Engineering as an alternate but I doubt you can transfer right into Engineering since it’s limited enrollment.</p>
<p>Glad you got to see a ball game…we were going to do that too but we are there during the All-Star break, dang it!</p>
<p>If changing majors requires changing colleges, it’s something he should do before orientation, since the groupings of tours, presentations, etc. at orientation is split first into groupings by college. If it’s an LEP that he wants to switch to, I doubt if he’ll be able to do it until completing some coursework (and getting good grades). I honestly don’t really know, he should email the academic advisor for the college he wants to go into for help.</p>
<p>D2 plans to double major, across 2 different colleges. The process is that she applied and was accepted under her primary major of Environmental Science/Policy and is under the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources (and also got a college-based merit scholarship, which means that it has to remain has her primary major). She also plans to major in Spanish, and has talked to the head of that department. In the fall she will add it as a secondary major, only because there may be some scheduling issues ahead that will be avoided if she’s also registered as a Spanish major (regarding being able to get permission to be in classes, etc.)</p>
<p>D1 is getting double degrees in Astronomy and in Physics, which are both majors under CMPS. I’m not even sure if she’s officially added Physics to her records yet, although she is following classes that will get her degrees in both. Since they are both in the same college, there are many less considerations.</p>
<p>For students/parents of students who went to orientation already-
How many credits did you sign up for?
How much did the advisors try to steer your class decisions?
Did you take mostly major related courses, or CORE required ones?</p>
<p>I took 15 Credits and you can see my classes here: <a href=“http://photos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs103.snc1/5024_1105191793551_1339440110_30340811_6599420_n.jpg[/url]”>http://photos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs103.snc1/5024_1105191793551_1339440110_30340811_6599420_n.jpg</a></p>
![http://photos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs103.snc1/5024_1105191793551_1339440110_30340811_6599420_n.jpg[/url]](http://photos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs103.snc1/5024_1105191793551_1339440110_30340811_6599420_n.jpg%5B/url%5D){kind=link}
<p>Did you find that you had the freedom to choose what you wanted? Or did whoever did your schedule try to steer you in the direction they thought was best?</p>
<p>I’m hoping that they give us the freedom, as I’ve essentially already chosen what classes and sections I want to take (assuming they let me). Now the only question is whether 17 credits (of which 3 are band) will be too much…</p>
<p>Not much freedom, other than the time slots. Advisor had DS’s schedule prepared when he got there. There were a few choices as far as the Honors Seminars, but other than that, no. He ended up with 16 credits. Two classes are in his major (sciences). They also recommended that although he could take the AP credit in some classes, not to. Many of the med schools want to see certain courses taken in college. So much for that. He likes that almost all of his classes are after noon though with the exception of an 8:00 a.m. Bio Lab. He has an Honors seminar at 6:00 p.m. one day of the week, which will last 3 hours.</p>
<p>The more preparation work you do ahead of time, the better. D went to one of the June orientations. She had a list of the classes that she needed to take for the two majors she plans to pursue, and the only influencing her advisor did was to tell her that she really should take Math 140 first semester, as it is a prerequisite for several of the (major) related courses she’s planning to take in the next year or so.</p>
<p>If the advisors think you’re taking too many killer classes for your first semester, they’ll probably suggest that you back off. At the parent orientation, the prof who talked said that they usually suggest that you take a couple of courses required for your major, and a couple of CORE required classes. </p>
<p>ELBlufer, considering band won’t be a class that you’ll have to do book-type studying for, 17 hours probably won’t be too much, but it depends on how tough the other classes are, and how time-consuming they’ll be outside of class.</p>
<p>I encouraged both daughters to take it easy first semester/first year. Older D actually had time to read books and was frequently bored her first semester (OK, so maybe she overdid it!)… She’s now into such “light” courses as Quantum Physics for this coming semester. Her days of being bored are long behind her.</p>