Freshmen

Find out how to do freshman year right. From packing tips and how to schedule classes to your first college party—let’s make it a year to remember.

Hitting a college campus for the first time as a student will activate your body’s fight or flight response. Resist flying straight back into the nest your parents just pushed you out of on move-in day. Fight through homesickness, academic challenges, struggling to make friends and getting just plain lost with these guides to all things freshman year.

Start off by understanding the new language that comes with college. You’ll quickly find out that big and little have nothing to do with size. And the turkey dump has nothing to do with dropping an actual bird from a window.

Then once you can speak the language, zero in on the 10 most relevant College Magazine articles you should read for your best chance at survival.

You’ll learn how to choose a major, avoid the freshman 15 and feed yourself (believe it or not, a ramen diet is not required).

Once you get past these two semesters, you can show off your trophies and battle scars. Until then, we won’t judge you for walking around campus with our guides pulled up next to your campus map.