About five months into the yearlong renovation of Chase Hall, Project Manager Kristi Mynhier feels that the undertaking has turned an important corner.

The first phase of construction, Mynhier points out, was dominated by demolition and by the abatement of hazardous materials. Those processes uncovered conditions that necessitated changes of plan and unforeseen work, including additional demo and abatement. Every construction project has its surprises, but they’ve abounded in Chase, for a variety of reasons.

But now the demo and abatement days are done, fundamentally changing the course of the renovation. “We’ve finally [transitioned] from being reactive, while we discovered and uncovered, to being proactive,” says Mynhier. “That’s probably the most crucial part of a project, when you can start to look forward and plan properly, rather than consistently discovering new things and having to pivot. 

“That’s where you start to get good progress.”

Site work is progressing at the entrance to Chase Hall on Campus Avenue, near Carnegie. The new retaining walls flank the course of a ramp that will lead to a revamped lobby on the ground floor. The wing walls in the foreground will be fronted with built-in concrete benches — an amenity for folks waiting at the bus stop that will return to this spot post-renovation. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Former stairwell, future atrium at a Campus Avenue entrance to Chase Hall. The wall “stripes” show where the stairs used to be. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Workers plan the next step in the creation of a new stairway near the entrance facing Carnegie Science. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

While remaining a main entrance into Chase Hall from Campus Avenue, the former stairwell near the Kenison Gate will become a sort of atrium admitting light into the building. Shown is one of two points where the floor will be extended into the atrium. The other is the next level up. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The east end of Chase Hall Lounge. The arch and surrounding bricks will be left exposed, but sheetrock will cover the righthand half of the wall. Peeping through the doorway are �ֲ���ý Project Manager Kristi Mynhier and a project engineer. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Surprise! Beneath the wallboard, the Chase renovation team expected to find a solid brick wall separating Chase Lounge from the lobby — but what was there instead were two brick columns. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Shown is the Chase entrance into the courtyard shared with Carnegie Science. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The angled wooden beams are load-bearing trusses that are original to this century-old section of Chase Hall. When the current renovation is complete, they will be partially exposed as an allusion to the building’s history. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The rush is on to frame up walls in the front half of Chase Hall. Shown is what will be a warren of Purposeful Work offices and meeting rooms. At left rear is the former main staircase connecting the three floors of the original structure. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

One of the last of several surprises that lent the Chase project such a thrill-ride quality, and gave Campus Construction Update so much great material (it’s always better when we don’t have to make things up), appeared in September.

Wooden floors in the building are supported by long beams, aka joists, whose ends rest in notches in the interior brick wall. Demolition in Chase Hall Lounge, though, revealed that the ends of a number of joists overhead had been sawed off, denying them contact with the joist pockets in the brick. 

The precise motivation for removing the joist ends isn’t known, but that work was done adjacent to windows. It’s believed that incoming moisture, whether because the window units failed or someone failed to close them, rotted the joists.

To compensate for the lost support, the cut ends were fastened together with additional pieces of lumber, serving as ledger boards. These in turn were attached to the brick wall, but this doesn’t provide the same quality of support as the original arrangement. That created some saggy spots in the second floor. But baseboard heaters concealed the cause of the droopiness until their removal during demo.

The fix, Mynhier explains, will entail removing interior brick where joist pockets once were, connecting the truncated joist ends to the exterior layer of brick with metal “ties,” and then rebuilding the interior wall. (In cross-section, the wall in question consists of a double exterior layer and a single interior layer, separated by an air gap.)

Joist right: Seen from below in Chase Hall Lounge, the thick gray wood at center is a joist supporting Chase Hall’s second floor. The joist end rests in a notch, or “pocket,” in the brick wall that helps bear the weight of the floor. Damaged by moisture, other joists had their ends cut off and a different, and less effective, wall attachment installed. The joist joints will be remedied during the current renovation. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

One flight up from the previous photo, empty joist pockets in the brick wall are obvious. The ends of floor joists once rested in those pockets, thereby supporting the floor, but were sawed off because of moisture damage. Called a ledger, the doubled board parallel to the brick was intended to take the weight once borne by the pockets, but hasn’t quite been up to the task, causing the second floor to sag. To fix the problem, metal ties that reconnect the joists to the brick will be installed. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The Chase Lounge windows to the right of center mark the approximate location of the overhead joists shown in the previous images. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

“It’s probably been about a month from initial discovery of the problem to having the engineer look at it, bringing the abatement contractor back to do the Chase Lounge ceiling, and then having the engineer finalize the plan” for repair.

So you can see how the whack-a-mole nature of exigency response in the Chase project has caused some shuffling of timetables. As we reported in September, the amount of effort going into MEP infrastructure — mechanical, electrical, plumbing — will be doubled from the original plan. That will happen around the beginning of November, as workers on the first floor start to complement those who have been busy upstairs for a few weeks now.

“In the next month you’ll see the overhead mechanical work continue,” Mynhier explains — “mechanical” referring largely but not exclusively to HVAC. “That’s really our critical path for the entire job.” 

“Also, to minimize the impact to the schedule,” she adds, “we’ve started framing everywhere” — meaning that the metal and wooden studs that hold walls up are being erected and, in effect, making floor plans visible. “That allows the in-wall [MEP] rough-ins to continue and allows us to at least get board on the walls.”

In fact, placing wallboard is well underway on the second floor, whose layout will be the least altered by the renovation. On the first floor, the former lobby and Purposeful Work area is a forest of metal studs and two-by-fours that will ultimately coalesce into the largest unified office space Purposeful Work has enjoyed thus far. And on the ground level, the first few studs for Student Affairs offices have appeared in the former College Store retail area.

“In December floor coverings will begin on the second floor,” Mynhier says, which will mark, if you will, the start of finish work.

Grand Central Stair: In December, too, assembly of a new Chase landmark will begin: what the project team refers to, variously, as the grand or central stair. 

“All of the wood is on site for the stair treads and landings, and the steel [for structural support] is on its way,” says Mynhier.

Sited near the Office of Intercultural Education, which will return to its old quarters in Chase at renovation’s end, a new elevator shaft will form the core of a staircase that rises from the ground floor (which really seems like the only logical way to go) and tops out at the OIE level. From there, a nearby stairway original to the building serves the second floor. (At the other end of Chase, near Carnegie Science, a current elevator and a new set of stairs will also terminate at the second floor.) 

Handy to the existing Campus Avenue entrance near Muskie Archives, the central stair will constitute one of the main arteries, if you will, through Chase. It will touch four building levels — ground floor; the Residence Life and Health Education area a half-level up, near the loading dock; the first floor; and the OIE floor, another half-level higher. (A fun fact for readers, if not for the renovation team, is that Chase Hall, with its two additions, is a three-story building containing nine discrete floor levels.)  

The central stair will be built in the area behind Chase Hall Lounge that we referred to last month as an abyss, created by removing two big sections of concrete floor slab. Now visible at the bottom of that gulf are a square depression that will provide a base for the elevator, and a pattern of holes where steel columns will be set to hold up the stairway and new floor slabs.

Meanwhile, we learned more about the building’s other main artery, which will begin where it always has — the Campus Avenue entrance near the Kenison Gate — but will otherwise give visitors an experience nearly as new as what the central stair has in store. 

The definitive differences lie at the street entrance itself. For one thing, as we’ve reported previously, entry to Chase will now occur a bit below ground level, via a ramp descending from the sidewalk. That will lead to a lobby sited approximately where, back in the day, you used to find your P.O. box and the College Store.

But a change more dramatic than the ramp involves the three-story former staircase just inside the door: The stairs are gone, they won’t be back, and that space instead will be a sort of atrium spilling light on people as they come and go, and, via glass interior walls, bringing daylight more deeply into the building as well. In fact, on the first and second levels, floor space will be extended into the atrium. 

These century-old wooden trusses on the second floor, and others downstairs, will be left partially exposed as a reminder of Chase Hall’s history. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Four rooms were combined to create an open space on the second floor. Note the stockpiles of wallboard and the new HVAC infrastructure, including the boxlike fan-coil unit, on the ceiling. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

New steel replaces a load-bearing wall on the second floor. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A technician connects a new HVAC fan-coil unit in a second-floor office in Chase Hall. Mechanical, electrical, and plumbing work — aka MEP — is a high priority in the Chase Hall renovation these days. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

New wallboard lines the corridor on Chase Hall’s second floor. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The construction zone in front of Chase Hall contains supplies — lumber, weatherproofing fabric, various forms of rebar, etc. At lower left, a hose drains an excavation near the building. To the right of center are new retaining walls near a building entrance. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Wall framing has begun in what will be Student Affairs offices in the ground floor space occupied long ago by the College Store. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This space once housed stairs connecting the three levels of the original 1919 Chase Hall. Still a main entrance to the building but with stairwise access moved elsewhere, it will be repurposed as an atrium. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

“It becomes more of a viewing area and a welcoming walk-in,” says Mynhier.

Once you’ve entered Chase through the atrium, you’ll find a variety of new and old stairways and elevators to take you where you’re going. 

So, in a sense, the central stair will take on the role of the stairs that are now gone from the atrium— that is, a consolidated means of accessing different levels of the building. Which is all, of course, more of a conceptual than practical distinction. After all, a key goal for the entire makeover is to render Chase easier to get around in.    

And speaking of that, retaining walls flanking the path of the forthcoming entrance ramp have been placed, as have foundations for two wing walls that will line the sidewalk. And a precast concrete drainage system will be installed along the Campus Avenue facade in the next couple of weeks.   

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update welcomes queries and comments about current, past, future, and current construction at �ֲ���ý. Write to dhubley@bates.edu, putting “Campus Construction” or “Didn’t the knights of olde used to joist? Did they ever get board?” in the subject line.

On June 20, the Dana Hall renovation at �ֲ���ý passed its inspection by the city of Lewiston, thereby earning the college a certificate of occupancy for Dana.

The next administrative hurdle to hop, as we reported previously, is so-called substantial completion, meaning that construction management firm Consigli has satisfied the contractual definition of a done deal and the college can again be the boss of the building.

“As you can see walking through, we’re still a little ways from that,” says Chris Streifel, �ֲ���ý project manager for Dana. But most of the outstanding work falls into the broad categories of final corrections and technological testing.

Construction workers return to Dana Hall after a break. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The new abundance of glass and open sightlines in Dana Hall helps bring the outside in. Shown is a writeup room on the second floor. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A clear plastic membrane protects new carpeting in a second-floor Dana Hall classroom. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Subcontractors’ vehicles parked on Alumni Walk near Dana. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Bare steam-supply pipes that we showed you the other month are now encased in white insulation. The location is the Dana Hall basement where feed lines from the campus-wide steam loop enter. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A fire-suppression system valve in a freshly painted Dana Hall stairway. The green reflection comes from an accent wall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The installation of lab equipment is still in progress in Dana 119. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Fume-hood controls in a first-floor lab. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Balloons are taped onto nozzles in a fume hood to help detect any leaks in the hood’s gas, air, and vacuum supplies. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A partially painted second-floor restroom corridor. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The view from a third-floor writeup room in Dana Hall. The color scheme and the ample use of glass are hallmarks of architectural firm and Dana renovation designer Payette. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A Dana Hall electronics lab. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Dana Hall seen from Alumni Walk on July 6, 2022. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A new window will give students using this Dana Hall lounge a striking view all the way to Commons. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

“With a couple more weeks, we should have a very different look in most of the rooms,” Streifel continues. By late July, substantial completion grows close, although Consigli will continue to have a role at Dana for some time thereafter. In the meantime, �ֲ���ý can move equipment and supplies into finished spaces. Substantial completion isn’t absolutely necessary until, as Streifel says, “we start bringing in people” later this summer. 

Approaching the former Dana Chemistry Hall from the Historic Quad last week, we were struck by how normal it all looks — surrounded by lush grass and trees and showing no visible signs of a construction project, other than the two literal signs at the entrance proclaiming Consigli’s presence and forbidding smoking.

The Alumni Walk side was a different story. Placed around the entrance were a table saw, a lot of cut wood, some dismounted doors, and a lawn mower. Subcontractor vans and trucks lined the walkway. Among the firms represented were Firesafe Equipment, Mechanical Services Inc., Minuteman Security Technologies, and Tekon Technical Consultants.

Tekon, of Portsmouth, N.H., is undertaking the complex task of testing and balancing flows of air and of water within the building’s HVAC system. (Rather than being sprayed directly onto building occupants periodically to warm or cool them, the water has a covert role, as it’s used to warm or cool circulating air. We have tried both the direct and the covert methods and can confirm that the latter is much neater and less likely to be misunderstood.) 

On the water side, the testing and balancing experts are “making sure that they’re getting proper gallons per minute at all the different devices that use it to condition the air locally,” Streifel explains. “From an air perspective, they’re looking to confirm they’re getting the flows that were calculated for each location where there’s a diffuser” — the device that actually pumps conditioned air into a space.

The goal is to balance air pressures so the overall HVAC system can maintain a flow throughout the building. “If you just open everything up wide, the very far end won’t get enough air and you’ll get too much out of the front end,” Streifel continues. The proper balance “allows you to get flow consistently where you want it through the whole train of the ductwork.” 

Mechanical engineers calculate those correct pressures in the building-design process.

There is still primary work to do in Dana — applying some surface treatments and other decorative elements, placing lab furniture and other casework, completing a few installations in the mechanical, electrical, and plumbing realms (aka MEP). But the Tekon presence is typical of the main thrust of progress these days: closing-out processes like firing up and testing equipment, performing punch-list inspections and making the resultant tweaks, and clearing out tools and supplies.

Offices were punch-listed starting the first week of July. Classrooms come next, then the teaching labs, and finally, toward the end of July, mechanical and utility areas. MEP testing, including the phase of whole-system tests known as commissioning, will continue throughout. And movable furniture, as opposed to stationary furnishings like lab benches, will start to show up this month.

If Dana is, by and large, on schedule, Streifel notes that crimps in various supply chains are causing a bit of heartburn. “As we’ve tried to close things out, we’ve had a little trouble getting some of the final marker boards [that we need], for example. A few cabinetry pieces here and there. So that’s holding up some things in some locations.”

“There’s a little bit of forest-for-the-trees going on,” Streifel adds. Along with physical things like marker boards and cabinet fittings, definitive information can also show up late. Even Consigli has to rely on its subcontractors for updates, and the subs are waiting to hear from their vendors.

“It’s just this chain of information that sometimes takes a little while to really catch up with the truth. We’ll know more over the next couple of weeks what really is a problem and what isn’t.”

“Constant evolution”: With most of its entrances closed, and one of them partially demolished, how does a person get into Chase Hall these days?

Well, not to be snooty, but most persons don’t. Only at the start of the 2023 academic year, when Chase reopens after a 15-month renovation, will members of the campus and the public be allowed into the building again. Until then, only folks connected with the renovation (or those who, like Campus Construction Update, are irrationally convinced that they’re connected) can get in.

Shown near the former Dining Services loading dock is the shaft and some components of a dumbwaiter that was installed to lift meals upstairs to dining areas, but was also used to lower deliveries to the college store, one flight down. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Demolition debris fills a trash container near the Chase Hall loading dock. At center, members of the Chase Hall renovation team are meeting on the dock. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Watch your step: Chase Hall’s main Campus Avenue entrance, bereft of stairs. The entrance will be rebuilt at ground level. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Now gutted and used to store ventilation ducts that will be discarded, this once was an office on Chase Hall’s second floor. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A new main stairway from the Chase Hall entrance nearest Muskie Archives will touch down at this location near the old Dining Services loading dock. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Once the use of student post-office boxes kept this spot on Chase Hall’s ground floor busy. But it’s now a place to park equipment and supplies as hazardous waste abatement takes place behind the wall and poly sheeting. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This view, from the once and future reception area for the Office of Intercultural Education, shows where a new stairway will provide much-improved access to the OIE. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The �ֲ���ý Musicians Union rehearsal space in Chase Hall has lost some of its walls to make way for a new stairway and elevator, but the facility will be rebuilt. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

For us, last week, entry was over the loading dock and through what, until 2008, was the service entrance to Dining Services. Kristi Mynhier, the �ֲ���ý project manager for Chase, led us from the dock through the former receiving area, which has been stripped down to the bare wall masonry.

Just a short distance inside we paused to ponder a space where, in the coming months, a brand-new major stairway will touch down. This area will look pretty sharp when that’s done, but at the moment its close resemblance to a dungeon is spoiled only by traces of now-removed facilities, including a dumbwaiter that was used into the 2000s to hoist meals upstairs and College Store deliveries downstairs.

Next we descended to what used to be the College Store and into the lower lobby, where the old mailboxes still stand, crossed out with big spray-paint X’s. The Little Room, past and future site of student gatherings, is largely untouched. But its original entrance and the nearby landing for a different main stairway — the one adjacent to the P.O. boxes and original to the building — are enclosed in plastic sheeting.

This, a roaring air pump, and a “Danger” sign flapping on the poly sheeting were our clues that haz-mat abatement specialists from Acadia Contractors were at work inside.

Having spent the early summer tearing out asbestos-bearing materials on the second floor, Acadia is now doing likewise with both that old staircase, which once led from the mailboxes and College Store up to Campus Avenue, and much of the southwest corner of Chase’s first floor.

Abatement here will go on till around the third week of July. That will be followed by structural demolition and then the construction of a new and improved stairway connecting the building’s three main levels (street access will be lowered to ground level). Acadia, meanwhile, will return to the second floor to take on additional abatement as decorative but hazmat-bearing (isn’t that always the way?) arches in a main hallway are prepared for removal. 

Mynhier took us up to the first level at a point where poly walls form a corner. Behind the plastic to one side is Chase Hall Lounge, which looks a lot like its old self, but in place of the contradancers and students playing billiards, we saw staffers from Consigli Construction, the firm overseeing construction in Chase. The corner’s other wall extends all the way to the door facing the courtyard that Chase and Carnegie share. 

We climbed another half-level into Memorial Commons, which won’t be involved in the renovation, and into back corridors where, until last spring, student musicians and others pursued various projects. Demolition of partition walls has opened this area wide, and that’s to clear space for that new main stairway.

A landing here will also accommodate a new elevator, and this will provide, for the first time, convenient access to the Office of Intercultural Education. The �ֲ���ý Musicians Union will return to reconstructed quarters in this vicinity.

Ending the tour, a back stairway we’d never seen deposited us on the second floor. Like the old Dining Services and College Store spaces, this too has been extensively gutted, but here the effect was even more dramatic, as enough wall structure remained to delineate the old floor plan.

In fact, the old walls had concealed surprises that changed the project team’s plans for this corridor, which most recently housed student-affairs offices. One such was that there were more layers of wall lining the corridor than the old plans indicated: In addition to the outermost layer, of modern wallboard, there was also old plaster-lath. (Proving once again that yesterday’s builders do often get the last lath.) 

This discovery means that in the interest of cost and expediency, the whole wall surface will have to be ripped out to make utility installations, instead of selectively slotting and then patching the wallboard.

Similarly, the removal of other walls along the corridor revealed load-bearing elements, both columns and a wall, that don’t appear on original plans. This necessitates a change in floor plan and adjustments to furniture purchases. But at least there won’t be any net loss of usable square footage.

“It’s part of the constant evolution of a renovation,” Mynhier says. “The entire project will go like this, where we’ll just find unforeseen conditions and have to pivot.”

Finally at Chase, we were interested to see that in anticipation of two new exterior entrances, a new trench has exposed most of the building’s foundation along Campus Avenue. White insulating foam and black fabric waterproofing have been applied to the foundation wall, and some gravel has been placed in the trench to enhance drainage, with more to come. 

Not a lotta terracotta: The race to finish renovating the Russell Street Track is taking a brief breather as general contractor Miller Sports Construction of West Chester, Pa., awaits the delivery of the track and field facility’s new surface.

Originally scheduled to arrive this week or next, the many rolls of Mondo Sportflex Super X 720 surface are now expected by July 26. Installation will commence immediately, notes Paul Farnsworth, the �ֲ���ý Facility Services project manager running the renovation.

Farnsworth explains that the manufacturer of the surface, the Italian company Mondo, encountered delays first in obtaining the pigment needed for �ֲ���ý’ choice of color — terracotta — and then in getting the many pallets of Sportflex onto a ship.

But now that vessel is en route to Montreal for unloading. “They don’t expect any issues at Montreal or trucking it here,” he says.

At the track itself, not much has happened since our last report. It’s no disparagement to say that it’s been about as interesting as watching asphalt cure, because, in fact, that’s what’s been happening. Oh, and a crew from Miller Sports did stop by on the 10th to flood the new coat of asphalt as a way of detecting low spots, which were outlined with spray paint and will be leveled prior to the Mondo application.

The only variable thereafter is weather, Farnsworth adds. But if there’s any silver lining to this summer’s worrisome lack of rain clouds, it’s the lack of rain-related construction delays.

Also on the athletics front, Farnsworth notes that the new bleachers at the Campus Avenue Field — the facility’s first permanent grandstand — are being erected this week. Finished by the end of June was the other major piece of that project, a new, accessible walkway from the field past John Bertram Hall and down to the intersection of Campus and Central avenues.

As noted previously, Farnsworth is overseeing work at the Olin Arts Center concerning heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning — HVAC. That multifaceted project is on schedule, with the original HVAC plant gone and two of three new air handlers being assembled. The third, assuming that no terracotta pigment will be needed, is due next week. 

One air handler will serve the �ֲ���ý Museum of Art, another the Olin concert hall and classrooms below it, and the third, the remainder of the building — classrooms, offices, practice rooms for musicians, and art studios for artists.

Meanwhile, HVAC experts have finished installing 76 variable air volume units, or VAVs. These are the diffusers that actually regulate the room-by-room flow of conditioned air throughout the building.

The project has also entailed the placement of new insulation, a spray foam, into the walls of the art museum, which has necessitated removing and replacing sections of interior wallboard.

Zachau Construction of Freeport, Maine, is the general contractor for the Olin work.

Nearby, on College Street, plumbing rough-ins have been completed prior to replacing 16 toilets in Page Hall. The old johns were original to the 1957 building. At the same time, PVC pipe is supplanting much of the original cast iron piping, which is so brittle, even when new, that the tool used to cut it simply garrotes the pipe with a tight chain. 

The new toilets, in six restrooms, will go in following wall tiling and a city inspection.

Finally, with Chris Streifel as project manager, Facility Services has rebuilt the three distinctively pointy bay windows on the front of Hopkins House. After 30 years of existence, they’d gotten leaky. It was a pilot project: Similar windows on the other two Residential Village dorms, Moody and Rzasa, will be rehabbed next year. 

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions, comments, and reminiscences about construction at �ֲ���ý College to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Construction” or “It’s a lath a minute with you, isn’t it?” in the subject line.

“Summertime
Demolition ain’t easy
Hammers thumpin’
And the sawin’ is nigh”

All right, so the search will go on for Campus Construction Update’s summer theme song (and our apologies go out to fans of DuBose Heyward and George and Ira Gershwin).

Nevertheless, summer remains peak season for construction at �ֲ���ý, thanks to (mostly) agreeable weather and a smaller campus population. So here’s a roundup of summer 2022 construction news, including:

• a major renovation nearing completion, that being Dana Hall’s;
• a major renovation in its early days, at Chase Hall;
• refurbishment of a key athletics facility, the Russell Street Track; and more.

True to their code: If all goes according to plan, Lewiston city officials will inspect Dana Hall on June 20 as a prerequisite to issuing to �ֲ���ý a certificate of occupancy.

A major milestone en route to the late summer reopening of Dana after an in-depth renovation, the inspection and certification are a process “that we’re always anxious about and hopeful it will go smoothly,” says Chris Streifel, �ֲ���ý project manager for the Dana project. “There’s a lot to it.”

The inspection will emphasize conditions relating to life safety, accessibility, and compliance with building codes — things like functioning doors and elevator, unobstructed egresses and walkways, operational lighting, sanitation, and ventilation systems, and so on.

“We need to have primary finishes completed as well,” Streifel adds. “There can’t be rough construction still to do. So flooring should be down and walls painted.”

Michael Carpentier is the Dana project superintendent for Consigli Construction, the firm managing the project for �ֲ���ý, and he will accompany the city building inspector and fire department officials during their visit.

Newly installed lab benches in Dana Hall Room 119 on June 6, 2022. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A third-floor bio lab in Dana Hall. The boxes projecting from the floor show where lab benches will be set: The boxes carry utility connections to the benches. The shiny wall surfaces can be written on. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Lab benches and other casework are stockpiled in a classroom on Dana Hall’s second floor awaiting installation. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Dana Hall on June 6, 2022. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This interior window affords views into the first-floor chemistry preparation area in Dana Hall. The tape, of course, is to call attention to the glass while work in the building continues. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A doorway from Dana Hall’s first-floor lobby, at Alumni Walk, into the main part of the building. The use of plenty of glass and the bright green accent paint are two visual motifs that Dana shares with the Bonney Science Center. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A painter at work in a Dana hallway. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

This panel in Dana Hall’s attic contains controls for local HVAC units serving each room in the building. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Sprouting a mind-bending array of steam, water, and control connections, Dana Hall’s main air handler was among systems recently test-started. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Local sitework firm Gendron & Gendron renewed the landscaping around Dana Hall. Shown are new shrubs, flowers, and grass around the brickwalled HVAC chiller, also new. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

The full-size, view-blocking construction site fence around Dana Hall has been replaced with a lightweight plastic barrier, seen at left, to protect the newly seeded grass. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Streifel says, “I’m confident that we’re going to be where we need to be” in terms of renovation progress by the 20th. “There’s a lot left to do, there’s no doubt about it. But there isn’t anything that appears to be throwing us off that objective. It’s a reasonable objective.”

Another milestone will likely appear soon after the occupancy certificate is issued: a formal declaration of substantial completion, which “could come as little as a week later,” says Streifel.

Substantial completion means that a project has met the objectives stipulated in the contract between construction manager and client. And it means that the legal ownership of the building in question reverts from the construction manager to its nominal owner — that being �ֲ���ý.

Next, the college will spend a couple weeks moving furniture and supplies into the 57-year-old Dana, a former chemistry facility now repurposed for introductory science education. The renovation will also serve to expand the college’s roster of general-purpose classrooms.

After a busy July getting the building squared away, Dana staff will occupy their offices starting Aug. 8. And a few weeks later Dana will reopen for classes along with the rest of campus.

Previously: Enough of looking to the future, as Campus Construction Update relapses into our preferred mindset of dwelling on (or in) the past — Dana’s recent past, at any rate. Since mid-May, various building systems have been test-started: the main air handler, HVAC water chillers, some of the variable frequency drives that operate pumps and fans for local temperature control. And Dana has been looped into the campus-wide steam system, which will heat water that heats interior air.

At the same time, Streifel says, the formal systems-testing protocol known as commissioning is in progress, albeit in an early phase that entails compiling documentation and ensuring that all the gizmos, contraptions, and whatchamacallits are properly placed and connected.

Thus far, “the commissioning agent’s been involved,” Streifel says. “We’ve had several commissioning meetings so far. But the real nitty-gritty is still to come,” that being the actual shaking-down of systems ranging from HVAC to data to building controls. “Late June and all of July will be heavy in commissioning” (and to account for changing seasons, some commissioning will likely go on well past July).

Similarly, though punch-listing has been in progress for weeks, it will soon expand from above-ceiling mechanical and electrical fixtures to, well, everything that’s ready for inspection.

Among the three teaching floors, the first remains closest to completion. Most of the casework — lab benches, cabinets, etc. — is in place in the laboratories. Flooring is about done, ceiling grids and many tiles are in place, top coats of paint abound, a lot of glass is mounted, and some doors are hung.

“I’d say the third floor looks the least finished,” says Streifel. “But even wandering through the second floor, we’re getting to the point where we’re seeing, ‘Oh, there’s one thing left to do there, one thing left to do there, one thing left to do there’ — but we can see the end result.”

Next step: no steps: Just a couple of weeks after the view-blocking fence was removed from the Dana Hall construction site, the same kind of fence (or even the same fence!) has been erected elsewhere for Campus Construction Update to peep over.

The new barrier encloses Chase Hall, and it came along as an ambitious revamp of the century-old building has shifted to a higher gear. As we reported in March, the goal of the 15-month makeover is to bolster Chase’s original role as a student center — and the means to that end include dramatic improvements to building accessibility and wayfinding, the enhancement of student-bookable spaces, and the clustering of key Student Affairs offices.

We arrived at Chase on Monday morning just in time to watch an excavator-mounted jackhammer obliterate the stairs at the main Campus Avenue entrance. (This was the first step, no pun intended, toward rebuilding the entrance at ground level.) It gave us a pang to watch the concrete crumble, as those stairs had always seemed like a special �ֲ���ý place: students waiting for the intercity bus or the Bobcat Express shuttle, folks with Chase business passing in and out, yours truly eating M&M Peanuts and staring at new construction across the avenue.

Inside Chase on Monday, an Acadia Contractors team was nearly done with a monthlong process of asbestos abatement on what the project team is calling the second floor. (Chase has something like nine levels, so we’ll just roll with it.)

Soon that team will move down one story, tape up their protective plastic sheets, and resume asbestos removal, primarily from areas of plaster-lath ceiling where new utility runs will go. They’ll concentrate on what used to be first-floor lobby and office space — you’ve probably been there — adjacent to that main Campus Avenue entrance.

Setting up a construction site fence at Chase Hall on June 6, 2022. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A site fence being set up around the Chase Hall construction zone on June 6. Jersey barriers are used as bases for the fence where vehicular traffic is present. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Walls have been stripped, temporary lights and electrical service run in, and some ceiling tiles removed in preparation for extensive demolition in Chase Hall’s former main lobby. The door at left leads to Campus Avenue. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

A new grand stairway will terminate in this approximate location in the basement of Chase Hall. The College Store formerly had office and stockroom space here. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Formerly the reception area for the Office of Intercultural Education, this space will open onto the upper end of a new master stairway in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Pipes, conduits, and other demolition debris lies in a heap in the former site of the College Store in Chase Hall. Through the glass at right are long-disused student mailboxes. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Supplies and tools have been staged into Chase Lounge as the the building’s renovation gets into gear. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Chase Hall’s front steps were no match for a pneumatic hammer. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Workers for Gendron & Gendron board up Chase Hall’s main entrance on Campus Aveue prior to the demolition of its concrete stairs. (Doug Hubley/�ֲ���ý College)

Meanwhile, upstairs where Acadia had just finished, workers for PBC Environmental of Kittery, Maine, will demolish walls and eventually a section of floor. Formerly the location of offices for Residence Life and other staff, this area will become the upper terminus of a new master stairway.

Soon thereafter, explains �ֲ���ý project manager Kristi Mynhier, “we’ll mobilize the framers so they can put the new wall layout in place, and the mechanical and electrical trades can come through with their rough-ins.”

Rather than executing the interior demolition on a broad front, Mynhier adds, PBC will take it one section at a time. “When you deal with structural demo, there’s always that little bit of the unknown, the need to go slow and be careful,” she says.

Track changes: After 20-plus years of service, the running surface on the Russell Street Track is being replaced this summer.

Like the previous surface, which was scraped up last month, the replacement is a product of Mondo, an Italian firm globally prominent in products for track and field facilities, among other realms. Arriving in July, the new topping is called Sportflex Super X 720.

Among related improvements to the track and field complex: the maximum depth of the steeplechase water jump has been reduced from 70 centimeters to 50, in accordance with new NCAA rules; in-ground fittings for new seasonal soccer ball-stop nets have been installed; and the complex now has a flagpole, a 30-footer erected by Lewiston’s own Neokraft Signs Inc.

The new Mondo track surface will consist of two layers. On top is Sportsflex Super X, selected for its elasticity and spike resistance — “imitated but never duplicated,” according to the manufacturer. (Just like Campus Construction Update!) The bottom layer consists of a matrix of air cells that provide athletes with nice bounce and shock absorption.

The old surface was original to the Russell Street complex, opened in 2001 as a replacement for the Garcelon Field track. The Mondo’s time was up, between exposure to the elements and simple wear and tear from all that running and jumping, as well as noontime walking by fitness-conscious �ֲ���ý folks.

Miller Sports Construction of West Chester, Pa., is redoing the track for �ֲ���ý. The work began in late April with the removal of the old Mondo. Under that was asphalt, and the top inch and a half, aka the wearing course was milled off next. The remaining base layer and the supporting substrate are all holding up well — as project manager Paul Farnsworth points out, a survey of the track early in this project showed that the substrate had pretty much retained the grades created during the original construction.

A new wearing course was laid this week. After 30 days of asphalt curing, more or less, it’s the Mondo’s turn (not to be confused with the soap opera As the World Turns, or the novel As the Earth Turns by Gladys Hasty Carroll, Class of 1925).

The rubbery surface comes in rolls. “It’s glued down, just like flooring,” Farnsworth explains. “So there’s a guy with a trowel that spreads the adhesive, and they roll out a section and straighten it up” or stretch it to fit the curves.

Wait a minute. One person on his knees with a hand tool spreading glue for 67,000 square feet of Mondo?

Yep. Farnsworth’s own response to this startling revelation was, “He must have a Popeye right arm.”

Then, prior to striping, the glue (to say nothing of that right arm) has to cure.

And that’s not all! Farnsworth’s workload at �ֲ���ý these days is typical for a Facility Services project manager in the summer. In addition to the track, he’s also overseeing the complete replacement of the HVAC system in the Olin Arts Center. While the new system will, naturally, be more efficient than the 36-year-old machinery it replaces, driving the project is the need for better humidity and temperature control in the �ֲ���ý Museum of Art, housed in Olin.

Additional energy savings will come with the addition of a so-called dry cooler, which takes advantage of cold temperatures outside to produce chilled water to help regulate temperatures inside without having to run mechanical refrigeration.

The project also entails installation of new wall insulation in the museum. During the construction, temporary climate control systems will support the museum’s stored art collection and the concert hall. The latter system is necessitated by this summer’s resumption at �ֲ���ý of Gordon Research Conferences after a two-year pandemic hiatus.

Rigging the temporary HVAC in the concert hall has meant getting into ductwork above the ceiling, which in turn has meant the erection of substantial staging. “We are scrambling, working weekends, to get the work done and the staging gone before Gordon shows up,” says Farnsworth. �ֲ���ý will this summer spanning June 25–Aug. 12.

Finally, back in the sporting sphere, Farnsworth is tending to the installation of permanent bleachers, seating up to 244, at the Campus Avenue Field. The firm A+ Athletics of Rollinsford, N.H., is doing the installation. Also in progress is the rebuilding of a pathway, newly ADA-compliant, from the corner of Central and Campus avenues to the grandstand.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions, comments, and reminiscences about construction at �ֲ���ý College to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Construction” or “Summer Construction at �ֲ���ý: The Musical!” in the subject line.

On a recent Monday afternoon, some three dozen �ֲ���ý students convened in Chase Hall’s Hirasawa Lounge to practice the CPR skills they’d learned that morning.

On a cue from Michael Dube, the instructor of the Emergency Medical Technician certification course, the students broke into small groups and gave 10 minutes of chest compressions and rescue breaths to dummies. Lights embedded in the dummies’ shoulders indicated whether they were applying enough pressure.

By completing the intensive course (40 hours a week over five weeks), the newly minted EMTs can join ambulance or first-responder teams in many places — including right on campus, with the �ֲ���ý Emergency Medical Services.

BEMS volunteers are the first responders for any call for medical help that comes to �ֲ���ý Security and Campus Safety, whether it’s a student with a sudden illness or a staff member who falls during an ice storm.

During a Short Term EMT training course, Robert Winckler ’21 (right) practices chest compressions on a dummy, while Mackenzie Winslow ’19 (center) gives rescue breaths and Bella Stone ’19 waits to rotate in. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

At all times of the day and night during the school year, at least three volunteers carry radios and essential medical supplies everywhere they go, ready to leave class, Commons, or their beds at a moment’s notice to get to a scene.

A dedicated cohort of 40 students, the �ֲ���ý EMTs can do everything from CPR to splinting bones to placing patients on backboards. They’re responsible for assessing a scene, providing some treatment, and, if necessary, helping transfer patients to an ambulance.

“They’re first responders for their peers, and we trust them,” said Senior Associate Dean of Students Erin Foster Zsiga, who oversees the student EMTs. “It’s a big job, a big responsibility, and really important work for the institution.”

Erin Foster Zsiga, senior associate dean of students, oversees the �ֲ���ý EMS.

A student board, headed by a chief and deputy chief, takes the lead in managing day-to-day operations such as scheduling and inventory, as well as policy development and recruitment.

Meanwhile, Foster Zsiga is there for support and guidance as needed. Working in tandem with BEMS leaders, she’s helped the organization secure funding and provide scholarships to a certification course. The college has also partnered with United Ambulance (where EMS course instructor Michael Dube is clinical coordinator) for additional quality control, including a consulting paramedic, and a range of training opportunities.

“We are taking what BEMS has already done, which was student-led, and provided the supplemental support of Student Affairs,” Foster Zsiga said. “There’s someone here who can help when they need help and answer questions.”

The student EMTs’ work is a valuable safeguard for the well-being of �ֲ���ý students, faculty, and staff on campus. It’s also a defining experience for the students. Often aspiring health professionals, they get a hands-on introduction to the world of medicine that’s valuable when applying to graduate programs.

Miles Lamberson ’19 of Hinesburg, Vt., who will be the BEMS chief of service next year, said he’s gotten calls while studying in the library, eating at Commons, and in the middle of the night before a big test. “I wouldn’t trade it for anything else,” he said. “I’ve learned so much from my fellow line officers, BEMS members, and patients alike about myself, medicine, and people.”

Student EMTs are on call for 12 or 24 hours at a time. In practice, emergency calls are sporadic, said Jillian Sheltra ’19 of Biddeford, Maine, who will be the deputy chief of service next year. BEMS can go weeks without a call, or get several on the day of a big event.

As with a student EMS program at any college, the nature of the call “depends on what’s happening on campus,” Sheltra said. “We see seizures pretty frequently and general illness things like the flu. We also respond to some traumas like sports injuries for club or intramural teams. We go to our fair share of intoxication-related calls.

“It’s kind of a mixed bag, everything from a chest pain call to, ‘I fell and stubbed my toe.’ You never know what you’re going to get.”

Jillian Sheltra ’19 of Biddeford, Maine, will be the �ֲ���ý EMS deputy chief of service in 2018–19. (Theophil Syslo/�ֲ���ý College)

When a call comes in (all calls also summon a United ambulance), the EMTs drop what they’re doing and go to the scene, either on foot or in a Toyota Highlander, affectionately named Heidi, that carries more equipment. They figure out what’s going on, provide necessary treatment, and decide whether to call off the ambulance.

Because of the wide range of possible emergencies, responders have to know a wide range of treatments. A basic EMT certification is required of all BEMS volunteers, many of whom earn it through the Short Term course.

After the 10 minutes of CPR practice, Dube, the United instructor, reminded the EMT hopefuls that the real world would be quite different from the controlled setting of the Hirasawa Lounge.

Students in the Short Term EMT certification course, offered by �ֲ���ý and United Ambulance, listen to instructions before practicing CPR on dummies. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

The reminder struck home for Mackenzie Winslow ’19, working in a group with Bella Stone ’19 and Robert Winckler ’21. They quickly realized how strenuous giving chest compressions is. When an instructor announced they’d been going for three minutes, “we looked at each other and said it feels like it’s been forever,” Winslow said.  

Winslow is a neuroscience major, Winckler is inclining toward the field, and Stone is a biology major. All three plan to go into healthcare careers, and all are interested in joining BEMS after they get certified.

“This is such a great way to learn different skills and get ahead in the field itself before we all start going to med school, PA school, vet school, wherever we’re headed,” Winslow said. “This is a great way to start practicing for the real world.”  

The skills student EMTs learn at �ֲ���ý reverberate beyond the campus.

Providing emergency medical care requires more than knowing certain procedures. EMTs have to be a calming presence in chaotic situations and, especially in a small community like �ֲ���ý, maintain professionalism, whether they’re on call or not.

Robert Winckler ’21, who’s looking at majoring in neuroscience, is getting a basic EMT certification this Short Term. The opportunity to get hands-on experience in healthcare drew him to the course.  “It’s a great summer job,” he said. “It’s also a good test to see if you can go into the medical field.”  (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

“You definitely have to be tactful,” Sheltra said. “You’re going to see people who had an emergency, and you’ll see them in Commons the next day. We take a lot of pride in our role, which comes across as respecting people’s privacy and being there when they need us.”

The skills student EMTs learn at �ֲ���ý reverberate beyond the campus. Many use their certifications to get summer jobs on ambulances in their hometowns, or further their education with an intermediate EMT or even a paramedic certification.

They can also parlay their experiences into a spot at a medical school or other graduate program in healthcare.

Billy Curley ’16, who was integral to strengthening the ties between BEMS and the college, is attending Harvard Medical School. Andrew Lachance ’17, last year’s chief of service, and Katie Stevenson ’17, the deputy chief, were also closely involved with increasing Student Affairs’ guidance and support in 2017; both will attend Tufts University School of Medicine in the fall.

Lachance, who is now a researcher at the National Institutes of Health in Baltimore, is looking to return to Maine as a surgeon or cardiologist. He said he could always find former �ֲ���ý EMTs attending the medical schools that interviewed him for admission, and the schools were impressed not only with his experience in the field but with his understanding of logistics, scheduling, documentation, and communications.

During his senior year, Billy Curley ’16 works with a participant in a session of the “How Everything Works” program at the Hillview Community Resource Center in Lewiston. A �ֲ���ý EMS leader as a student, he’s now at Harvard Medical School. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/BAtes College)

“You know you have the capabilities to work well under pressure and in teams, communicating with patients when they’re at some of their worst moments,” LaChance said. “You can give examples of calming down a patient, giving them mental health resources they need, or splinting a fracture. It’s such valuable real-world experience that’s important for someone going into the medical field, but it’s also translatable to business or politics or anything else.”

“It takes a strong person, but it’s super rewarding.”

Sheltra, who earned a two-year paramedic certification in addition to her �ֲ���ý courses, also plans to go to medical school — and because she was an EMT at �ֲ���ý and elsewhere, her interests have shifted from surgery to emergency medicine. The day-to-day work of helping people in need has defined her experience, she said.  

“Someone’s calling you because they’re probably having one of their worst days, and for you to not make that your worst day too, and then to get up and go to work the next day — it takes a strong person, but it’s also super rewarding,” Sheltra said.

“We respond to these times that people are having where they’re sad or they’re hurt or they’re sick, and to be able to fix that and make it a little bit better for them is ideal.”

Breaking the ice with a group of first-year students, Darby Ray says, “Tell me, in one word, how you’re feeling.”

It’s a morning in late August and the group fills a lounge in �ֲ���ý’ Harward Center for Community Partnerships. Ray, the Harward Center’s director, goes on to label her own mood: curious.

The students chime in. One, like Ray, is curious. Another is surprised, a third anxious. Nervous, observant, happy — all perfectly credible feelings for students new to college.

But these young adults are “new to college” in a way that’s uncommon in the Class of 2021 and at �ֲ���ý generally: They are among the 66 members of the incoming class, or about 13 percent, who represent the first generation of their families to go on to higher education.

Members of the Class of 2020 get acquainted during an academic-planning session in August 2016 as part of the Bobcat First! program. The college’s record of supporting student success garnered an invitation to the American Talent Initiative, an effort to expand college access for low-to-moderate-income students. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

This first-generation leap forward comes with some distinctive experiences. Equipping first-gen students to encounter those experiences is the �ֲ���ý initiative Bobcat First!, now in its third year. The program builds community and a sense of belonging for first-gens, and enriches their understanding of the (often unspoken) rules for navigating college.

“There’s no one in our families to talk with us about their college experiences.”

Bobcat First! provides practical know-how, networking support, and, crucially, a certain sense of identity and self-confidence — all designed to promote participants’ success at �ֲ���ý and beyond. Nationally, degree attainment for first-gen students tends to lag behind continuing-generation students. (Over a six-year average, 4 percent fewer first-gens in the cohorts starting at �ֲ���ý from 2007 to 2010 attained a degree than continuing-generation students.)

“First-generation students don’t have the same resources as students whose parents have college degrees,” says Nina Flores ’20 of Floresville, Texas. One of 30 B1st participants in 2016, Flores is now a peer mentor in the program.

“There’s no one in our families to talk with us about their college experiences,” she explains. That means, among other things, that academic customs, procedures, and jargon can come as a complete surprise to the first-gen student.

“And often we come from school systems that leave us less prepared for college courses,” Flores continues. “It’s a lot of pressure to keep yourself motivated, especially if there’s no one at home who can relate to the difficulties and guide us through them.”

Bobcat First! family members talk with co-director Julisa De Los Santos (left) during a reception at the Office of Intercultural Education during Back to �ֲ���ý Weekend attended by President Clayton Spencer and other college leaders. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

A yearlong program for each cohort of first-year, first-generation students, B1st consists of an immersive week on campus just prior to regular first-year orientation, followed up throughout the academic year with monthly group lunches and other gatherings, both social and informational. The program is opt-in: Roughly half of eligible students chose to take part both this year and last.

During that initial August week, participants “live together and participate in programs designed to help them transition and feel at home here,” explains Jessica Perez, assistant dean of students for student transition and support. She co-directs the program with Julisa De Los Santos, interim director of the Office of Intercultural Education. “So by the time regular Orientation starts, they are feeling pretty good about being here.”

During the 2017 pre-orientation week, participants resided in Small and Cheney houses, wood-frame houses a few doors apart on College Street.

“By the time regular orientation starts, they are feeling pretty good about being here.”

Faculty and staff led workshops on such practical topics as time management, student employment, and academic planning. There were visits to campus departments and resources, such as the session that introduced the group to the Harward Center.

First-gens, says Perez, may “walk into a college not knowing what ‘office hours’ are. When a professor says, ‘Sign up for office hours,’ you’ve never heard that phrase before. It’s helpful for someone to actually define that.”

“Talking to professors was a lot easier” after the pre-orientation week, says Ryan Lizanecz ’20 of Portland, Maine. Like Flores, he was in B1st in 2016, the inaugural year for the current programming, and is now a B1st peer mentor. “Talking to, really, any staff or faculty, being comfortable on campus — just everything was so much easier.”

A Bobcat First! participant last year and a peer mentor this year, Ryan Lizanecz ’20 of Portland, Maine, poses on Alumni Walk. For him, the program for first-gen students made “everything so much easier.” (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

Also during the first week, a campus scavenger hunt powered by the GooseChase app helped the newbies learn �ֲ���ý landmarks. (Overheard during the hunt: “The lake is over there.” “You mean the Puddle?”) But the hunt was also intended to help the students learn about each other.

“I couldn’t imagine living the first year at �ֲ���ý without knowing the group first,” says participant Jinzhi Wei ’20 of Liuzhou, China. “I was lucky to find people that can empathize and resonate with me.”

“I found the closest group of �ֲ���ý friends that I have” through the program, Lizanecz says. “We all stay in touch. We can always talk to each other.”

Jessica Perez, Bobcat First! co-director and assistant dean of students for student transition and support, works with first-generation students in August 2016. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

In short, making connections both within the B1st cohort and beyond it is key to the program. And it’s connection-building on a broad scale.

During Back to �ֲ���ý Weekend, in September, the Office of Intercultural Education hosted a reception for B1st students and their families. It was a warm and festive event attended by President Spencer and members of the college’s senior staff.

Parents “want to connect with someone,” says De Los Santos. “They are really thoughtful and want to be a part of the process. We tell parents that this is also for them, this is their process — ‘This is a celebration not just of your student, but of yourselves. This is a family accomplishment.’”

It’s an impromptu meeting of Bobcats First! members from the Class of 2021 and program mentors on Campus Avenue on Aug. 24. From left: Kyle Larry ’21, Samantha Alexander ’20, Doris Etienne ’20, Anais Gonzalez ’20, Lebanos Mengistu ’21, and Samatar Iman ’21. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

B1st students also meet alumni who were themselves first-gen students at �ֲ���ý. As De Los Santos says, the �ֲ���ý education is “not just about their experience here but beyond.” And first-gens also often lack the career-enhancing social connections that accompany a family history of higher education.

“It’s great to hear from alumni who are first-gen,” De Los Santos says. “They talk about their first jobs, and how you negotiate a salary. Or, if you have multiple, intersectional identities, how does that play out in a position?”

“Your first-gen identity, you essentially carry it for the rest of your life.”

Herself a first-gen student, De Los Santos adds, “Sometimes first-gens and their parents have a very linear way of thinking of careers. In my family it was a lot about, doctor, lawyer — careers that we were familiar with. And alumni allow students to think creatively about using what you have learned here and about your purpose in life.” (A theme echoed in �ֲ���ý’ Purposeful Work programming.)

Lizanecz agrees. “I discovered through alumni that not all their paths were so clear-cut,” he says. “Maybe you don’t have to do everything perfectly to get where you want to be. That was really important, and for me it was an eye-opening experience.”

By example as much as anything, Bobcat First! also imparts signature �ֲ���ý values — community and diversity. “I’ve seen that through this program very easily,” as Lizanecz says. And in keeping with the fundamental �ֲ���ý notion of the transformational power of differences, the program encourages its participants to embrace their first-gen identity, rather than feeling like it’s something they have to compensate for.

“Your first-gen identity, you essentially carry it for the rest of your life,” De Los Santos says. “You can name it and let them know, ‘A lot of other folks are feeling how you’re feeling, and struggling the same ways that you’re struggling, and this is why.’” (A total of 235 �ֲ���ý students are first-generation.)

“It’s really rewarding to see them get invested in the �ֲ���ý community,” says Perez, “and find ways to become leaders here, and do things that they might not have thought that they would do otherwise.

“They bring a lot of strength and grit with them,” she says. “These students are often very proud and excited that they can be here. And they should be.”

A Maine landmark is reflected in sunglasses worn by Perla Figuereo ’21 of the Bronx, N.Y., during a visit to Portland Head Light, in Cape Elizabeth. Members of �ֲ���ý’ Bobcat First! program took part in a Greater Portland day trip during the program’s August 2017 pre-orientation week. (Theophil Syslo/�ֲ���ý College)

On the evening of Sunday, Aug. 27, as hundreds of first-years eagerly anticipated their arrival at �ֲ���ý, one �ֲ���ý senior was preoccupied by thoughts of home.

On campus for training as a residence coordinator at �ֲ���ý, Danielle Fournier had stayed in close contact with her parents as Hurricane Harvey approached their home in Sugar Land, Texas, near Houston.

When the storm hit, “the water filled our streets almost immediately, to the point that people were paddleboarding, kayaking, and boating down our street, which was an odd phenomenon,” says Fournier.

On campus as Hurricane Harvey hit her hometown of Sugar Land, Texas, Danielle Fournier ’18 said the support she received was “really, really profound.” (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

Among the residence coordinators and student affairs staff here on campus, “I was the only one in that group that had strong roots” in the region impacted by Harvey, Danielle says. “And the �ֲ���ý community reaching out to me and lifting me up was really, really profound.

“Everybody wanted to know how my family was doing and people would ask, and give me space to process some of that,” she continues, “especially in the tense moments when we weren’t really sure what was going to happen. The administration was particularly supportive.”

As it happened, Harvey’s floodwaters rose to mere inches away from the Fourniers’ house — but never got inside. “We had very, very little damage to the house structure as a whole,” says a grateful Fournier.

In addition to a fair amount of stress, Harvey handed Fournier some food for thought vis-à-vis her studies. An economics major, she’s planning her thesis around the aftermath of the 2010 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, likely with a focus on an intriguing issue: the restoration of trust in the Louisiana oyster fishery following the massive spill.

“The time frame for the reconstruction of an industry is what I’m studying for my thesis, but also something that I’m observing in my city. That parallel has been really interesting,” she says. “How long does it take to rebuild your sense of normalcy?”

An unidentified kayaker and observers in Danielle Fournier’s neighborhood in Sugar Land, Texas, during Hurricane Harvey on Aug. 27. (Juli Fournier)

While only a handful of �ֲ���ý students were affected by the back-to-back hurricanes Harvey and Irma, all said they felt the lift of concern and support from the college.

Andrea Russo ’19 of Cheshire, Conn., was participating in a study-abroad program (directed by Heidi Hertler ’89) on one of the Turks and Caicos Islands when Irma cropped up. Forced to evacuate a field station on sparsely populated South Caicos — and with her School for Field Studies program on the island ultimately canceled — she’s back at �ֲ���ý, living in one of the Campus Avenue dorms and taking courses.

During a tense lead-up to the storm through Labor Day weekend, and fast-paced evacuation planning as Irma approached, “there was always someone from �ֲ���ý in contact with me,” says Russo, an environmental studies major.

Andrea Russo ’19 of Cheshire, Conn., found herself back at �ֲ���ý after Hurricane Irma disrupted her Caribbean study abroad program. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

Tina Mangieri, head of the Center for Global Education, “was perfect,” Russo says. “When I started having inklings that something may be going on, I emailed her saying, ‘I don’t know what’s going on, can you please figure it out?’” Mangieri and SFS were in constant contact throughout the situation. “It was amazing.”

The �ֲ���ý housing office, she adds, found accommodations for her right away. And Mangieri worked with the Registrar so that Russo was able to register for courses within hours of hearing that the SFS program was canceled. After her return, on Sept. 10, her professors made sure she was up to speed on what she’d missed in the first week of classes.

“Even Student Financial Services was aware of my situation long before my father called them and already had a plan in place to handle it,” says Russo. “Overall, everyone at �ֲ���ý allowed me to make the fastest and smoothest transition possible.”

“Everyone was extremely understanding.”

Along with a few �ֲ���ý students, at least one �ֲ���ý faculty member found her plans changed by the storms. Carolina González Valencia, assistant professor of art and visual culture, hosted family who left coastal Florida ahead of Irma under a mandatory evacuation order.

Her mother, stepfather, and brother thought first of going to a shelter, but the stepfather’s health made that idea seem unworkable. Making that decision was the hardest part of the situation.

Carolina González Valencia, assistant professor of art and visual culture, hosted family members who left coastal Florida ahead of Irma under a mandatory evacuation order.

Joining forces with an uncle and a cousin, they started driving toward North Carolina. But storm predictions cast a shadow on that destination, too, and, feeling some panic, the party decided to shelter with family: González, who has an apartment near campus.

Her relatives arrived Sept. 10 after a three-day drive, and headed for home on the 13th, wondering what awaited them. Despite the storm worries, it was a good visit, says González.

The first Maine visit and Eastern Seaboard transit for her uncle and cousin, the trip added “a layer of adventure I think they enjoyed,” says González. Despite their arrival at the busy start of the semester, “it was better to have them here.”

Follow along as photographers Phyllis Graber Jensen and Theophil Syslo, and writers Doug Hubley and Emily McConville, share sights and stories from the Class of 2021’s arrival on Aug. 28.

While this time-stamp presentation is a span of just 12 hours, Opening Day begins the experience of a lifetime for students and families.

7:34 a.m.

It’s always a goal that the incoming class should encounter a lint-free Student Affairs staff, so Assistant Dean of Residence Life and Health Education Molly Newton rolls a lint remover over a jacket sleeve belonging to Director of Student Life Blake Reilly.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

Along with student Orientation leaders, they’re awaiting arrivals to Chu and Kalperis halls, on Campus Avenue.

Meanwhile, about 200 yards away, first-year students are doing what they need to do first: reporting to the Central Avenue entrance of Commons for their official check-in.

They’re arriving at the rate of about one per minute, estimates Jennifer Foley, an Opening Day volunteer whose day job is as associate vice president for college advancement.

With a decisive handshake and “Welcome to �ֲ���ý,” Foley greets the first-years and makes sure they know the drill once they get inside Commons.

An important aspect to her job, Foley notes, is ensuring that the new students check in by themselves — and feel comfortable doing it — as their parents are directed toward their students’ residences.

“It’s the first time kids are asked to do something on their own” at �ֲ���ý, she says.

7:44 a.m.

Early arrivers Barbara and Kerwin Charles, parents of Michael Charles ’21 of Valley Stream, N.Y., get help from Michael Hogue ’20 of Chicago and Brielle Antonelli ’18 of Warwick, N.Y., as they move their son’s gear into Kalperis Hall.

Hogue and Antonelli represent some of the variety of student leaders who pitch in on Opening Day. Hogue will lead a group of first-years on an outdoor trip to Mount Blue in two days, while Antonelli will assist new students throughout the next several days as an Orientation Week Leader, or OWL.

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7:52 a.m.

Hundreds of Bobcats help the new students move in, including college staff members (i.e., the Welcome Crew) and students like this group posing on Campus Avenue: Orientation Week Leaders (OWLs), AESOP outdoor trip leaders, and student members of the Residence Life staff.

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8:15 a.m.

As vehicles pull up to residences, student Orientation leaders descend like a NASCAR pit crew to begin the unpacking.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

8:15 a.m.

Back at Commons, students approach the four check-in tables in ones and twos. Conferences and Campus Events staff are giving the first-years their room keys, student IDs on lanyards, and stainless steel PRCs or Personal Reusable Containers — that is, sustainable beverage cups.

“There’s no food without it.”

Kelly Perreault of Campus Events has her spiel down pat: Don’t lose the ID, she warns the students good-naturedly. They’ll need it for building access, library privileges, and board plan: “There’s no food without it.” She also explains the PRC program and reminds the students to hand-wash the mugs before drinking from them.

Brenda Pelletier, conferences and campus events manager, estimates that about 150 students have checked in so far, including one right at the crack of 7 a.m.

8:23 a.m.

Wearing a Welcome Crew T-shirt, President Clayton Spencer greets Erin Bucki ’21 of Saint Paul, Minn., outside of Commons.

Theophil Syslo/�ֲ���ý College

Security staff, wearing bright fluorescent visibility vests, direct traffic. Various passersby  — pedestrians walking dogs or heading to Merrill Gym, commuters in their cars, and food-laden tractor-trailers pulling into the lot between the dining hall and Alumni Gym — add texture to the scene.

8:42 a.m.

Moving over to Chu and Kalperis halls, President Spencer greets the family of Layla Dozier ’21 of the Bronx, with a friendly admonishment about father Andre Dozier’s Yankee gear. At left is Layla’s brother, Andre Jr., and her mother, Doris.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

The next family to arrive at Chu and Kalperis is that of Solaine Carter ’21 of Tucson, Ariz.

“You guys are amazing,” says mom Beth Mitchneck, as students in garnet shirts quickly empty the minivan, then cart boxes, bags, and a framed photo of Solaine’s dog to the second floor of Kalperis.

It’s a surprisingly efficient end to a long drive. The family left Tucson on Aug. 15 and wound their way across the country, visiting friends, meeting Solaine’s roommate in Nashville, and dropping Solaine’s older sister off at graduate school.

Solaine, fresh from her check-in at Commons, arrives at the dorm. The college prepared her well for Opening Day, she says. “I’ll be like, ‘Mom! I don’t know what I’m supposed to do for X!’ And then, two seconds later, I get an email about X.”

She’s looking forward to the opportunities Orientation affords her. “I’m really excited to meet new people, learn about myself,” she says, then heads inside to see her room.

8:46 a.m.

At Kalperis Hall, President Spencer joins the effort to help first-years move in.

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8:47 a.m.

Settling in, Jaimin Keliihoomalu ’21 of Kapolei, Hawaii, relaxes with his guitar in his room in the 280 College Street residence.

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8:50 a.m.

Jake Bart ’21 of New York City felt the early morning chill, but describes his introduction to �ֲ���ý overall as “nice.” His mood is “mostly excitement but a little nervous,” largely about beginning his first prolonged stay away from home. In that vein, he notes, “Mom’s a little emotional, but Dad’s doing pretty well.”

It’s too early to think about a major. “I’ll try a lot of things and see where that leads me,” Jake says. And why �ֲ���ý? “Mostly the vibe. Everyone’s very nice. I saw myself here.”

8:55 a.m.

At 280 College Street, Jim Guzelian, the college’s environmental health and safety specialist, helps Hannah Lucas ’21 of New York City place risers under her bed as her mother, Elizabeth Lucas, looks on.

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9 a.m.

At Kalperis, Sommer Glasgow ’21 of Salt Lake City unloads her family’s car with the help of student leaders, hauls everything upstairs, and starts to unpack, placing a Keurig in a prominent place.

A few minutes later, two Junior Advisors introduce themselves. James MacDonald ’20 of Quincy, Mass., and Kelly McDonald ’19 of Whately, Mass., (not siblings, they’re quick to say) welcome her to the dorm and to �ֲ���ý.

As JAs who live amidst a group of new students known as a First-Year Center, their job throughout the year is to mentor the new students, create activities for them, and uphold community standards.

But their biggest goal today, MacDonald and McDonald say, is to make the students feel welcome. They’re greeting — and reassuring — families, answering questions, and helping first-years get settled.

“I hope they get comfortable with campus so they’re not intimidated or hesitant to know where they’re going and try new things,” MacDonald says.

9:17 a.m.

In Kalperis Hall, Carter Ros ’21 of Hailey, Idaho, takes direction from his mother, Margo, in setting up his room. He’s an aspiring Nordic skier.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

At Wentworth Adams Hall, the balloons are swaying, “Adams Hall” posters displaying, music playing — the Bee Gees’ “Staying Alive.” It’s all the handiwork of the student residence life staff, who are here in enthusiastic evidence.

Nevo Polonsky, coordinator of campus life and residential programming for Student Affairs, explains that Junior Advisors are typically in touch with the first-years in their charge during the summer, so for the newbies, “it’s much more exciting to put a face with a name.”

He has seen a quick integration of new students into the fold, he adds, because there’s such a diversity of interests among both the new and established students. Because common interests are easy to find, “a lot of incoming students have already gotten connected to someone,” he explains.

9:34 a.m.

By mid-morning on Alumni Walk, it’s a hub of activity as students move in at Parker Hall, the second-oldest �ֲ���ý building, built in 1857.

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Ruth Veleta and her husband are delivering Tom Hennessey ’21 of Middletown, Conn., to his digs in Parker Hall. It’s not her first kid-to-college rodeo — her step-daughters are college graduates — but it’s still kind of a wrench. “We’re trying to stay future-oriented and hold the tears till the end of the day,” she laughs.

9:36 a.m.

Abra Kaplan ’21 of Oak Park, Ill., stretches to pin a �ֲ���ý College banner on the wall of her Rand Hall room with the help of her father, Gary Kaplan.

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9:37 a.m.

Moms and daughters meet and greet in Kalperis Hall. From left, Elizabeth Fairman ’21 of Lathurp Village, Mich., her mother, Sarah Fairman, roommate Joselyn Jaramillo ’21 of Newark, N.J., and her mother, Nelly Jaramillo.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

Jaramillo has been on campus for the past week as a Bobcat First! participant. The night before, she invited Fairman to check out their room on the second floor of Kalperis.

Fairman first heard about �ֲ���ý from her college counselor, whose son is an alumnus. When she took a tour and stayed overnight, she was struck by the campus’ beauty and sense of community.

“They were so nice and so welcoming, and I loved the emphasis on the outdoors as well,” she says.

The move-in, and everything up to it, leaves Fairman’s mother pleased. She knows �ֲ���ý will help Elizabeth figure out what she wants to do, while being in the outdoors and making friends.

“The one thing that we discovered in our searches is that we were looking for her to find her people,” says Sarah Fairman. “We think she found it here.”

10:06 a.m.

Nancy Crate, mother of Will Crate ’21 of South Hamilton, Mass., pays for a wrap and bandana for Tucker, the family’s Jack Russell terrier, who jumps for joy.

Staffing the cash register are College Store director Gail St. Pierre, and her daughter, Abrielle, 11.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

10:14 a.m.

The Resource Fair in Perry Atrium is an exposition of more than a dozen �ֲ���ý offices and services ranging from the �ֲ���ý Career Development Center to the Sustainability Office.

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We overhear Multifaith Chaplain Brittany Longsdorf and the mother of a new student discussing the eight banners representing world faith traditions in the Peter J. Gomes Chapel.

One of the banners, a tree, represents the Sikh religion, Longsdorf explains, and the planet Earth stands for humanist or pagan traditions. “So there are quite a few pagans, then?” the woman asks. “There’s not an official group, but there’s significant interest,” Longsdorf replies.

10:17 a.m.

Eliza Fischer ’21 of Chicago gets settled in Kalperis Hall.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

Out of sheer excitement, she woke up at 6:30 this morning. Part of a sizable �ֲ���ý contingent staying at the Hampton Inn in downtown Lewiston, Fischer and her family all felt torqued up by the momentous day ahead, but were able to settle down some over coffee and bagels at Forage, a wood-fired bakery and market on Lisbon Street.

Fischer, whose academic interests include international politics or environmental studies, visited a lot of schools, but was sold by “how nice and amazing the people are at �ֲ���ý.” She’s nervous to be away from home for the first time, but more excited.

10:30 a.m.

Prarthana Mocherla ’21 of Old Tappan, N.J., and her parents, Sunita Abraham and Pavan Mocherla, talk with Paul Menice, interim director of security and campus safety, at the Resource Fair in Perry Atrium.

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“My husband and I were just talking about how well things are going,” says Abraham, who’s taking a break while Prarthana scopes out the fair.

Earlier, she recalls, “a group of wonderfully enthusiastic people grabbed her stuff and whisked it up to the fourth floor” of her daughter’s dorm.

Prarthana is an only child: “I have been weepy and teary for the last four or five days,” says Abraham. “I think she’s just waiting until 5 o’clock, when we leave.” Joining the conversation, Prarthana says, “I’m fine. I think it’ll hit after they leave.”

Another parent encountered at the Resource Fair, John Shaw says that “it’s hard to believe how quickly they grow up,” referring to his son, Keaton Shaw ’21 of Middleton, Wisc.

The elder Shaw explains how, back in the day, he and his wife were part of a cohort of young couples who all moved into their neighborhood in Middleton around the same time. Now those couples are becoming empty nesters, and the next round of young families is coming in. When your kids are little, Shaw says, “cherish it. It goes too fast.”

10:30 a.m.

During a lull in the pulling up of cars and the getting out of boxes and the jostling for coveted elevators, the group of orientation leaders at Chu Hall starts an impromptu dance party to “Eye of the Tiger.”

Grace Jurkovich ’18 of St. Paul, Minn., an OWL, has a high opinion of her task: “We have the best job on campus right now, which is really to facilitate the fun.”

Today, the fun includes dinner in Commons and a hike up Mount David. Later this week, Jurkovich will lead a restaurant tour of Lewiston.

“All the first-years on campus are equalized on the same nervous level.”

Amelia Wilhelm ’18 of Charlotte, N.C., a residence coordinator in Hopkins House who was Jurkovich’s first-year roommate, says their goal is to get new students out of their dorms and into the wider �ֲ���ý community.

“All the first-years on campus are equalized on the same nervous level, so providing the programs to put all those people together and get them interacting in whatever way they want to be interacting — I think it’s a great system,” Wilhelm says.

Both Jurkovich and Wilhelm are impressed by today’s weather, the first-years’ room-decorating skills, and the welcome messages on the Chu Hall blackboards.

“This is a weird adult thing to say, but I’m so excited to move my children into college, because what will dorms look like in, like, 20 years?” Wilhelm says.

10:57 a.m.

At the campus-facing entrance to Commons, one sees large green inflatable sofas and hears Cyndi Lauper singing “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.” And one must simply ask why.

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It’s the OWL Hub: A one-stop offering from the Orientation Week Leaders, a student team that has put together amusements and recreational activities to help first-years ease stress and fill vacant moments during Orientation. (OWLs T-shirt slogan: “OWL be there for you.”)

The Hub is the brainchild of OWL Allison Berman ’18 of Philadelphia. Last year, she says, “a lot of students wanted a place to hang out, ask questions, find things to do.” Hence the Hub, with its snacks, cornhole boards and other games, the sofas (which proved very popular, especially with certain tapped-out dads), and, of course, Cyndi. It’s not just girls who want to have fun.

12:45 p.m.

Appetites whetted by move-in work, hungry queues form for the Family and New Student Barbecue.

On the menu: fresh fruit salad, brussels sprout panzanella salad, and cole slaw; for sandwiches, pulled chicken, pulled pork, and chipotle barbecued tofu with grilled vegetables; for sides, maple brown sugar baked beans, roasted corn, and cheesy corn bread; and for dessert, whoopie pies in blueberry and vanilla.

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12:46 p.m.

Zhao Li ’21 of Guangzhou, China, and Rio Fujii ’21 of Tokyo have staked out a spot under a tree. Each flew 15-plus hours from their countries to Boston, then took buses to Portland, where Associate Dean of Students for International Student Programs James Reese picked them up. They met in Commons this morning, bonding over an interest in politics.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

Li, who knew she wanted to attend a liberal arts college, heard of �ֲ���ý through a college counselor, and applied early decision.

“I find that it is academically strong and I value that in this school,” she said.

Accustomed to the high-rises of her home city, Li liked the shortness of �ֲ���ý’ buildings. Fujii, here for one year on the Hirasawa exchange program, was struck by the openness of the campus — her home university in Japan is closed to anyone without an ID.

Fujii said she was excited for the rest of the student body to arrive.

“I love campus,” she said. “I love people, so everything is good, but the thing is, I’ve only met international students, so I really hope that spending one year here, I’ll find local people, American students to get along with.”

A ways away, Gift Kiti ’18 of Nairobi, Kenya, understands the new students’ nervousness. As a JA in Kalperis, she tries to make move-in as smooth as possible, welcoming the students to �ֲ���ý and directing them to the resource fair and Wal Mart as needed.

“I hope they are open to each other and make potential friends, and they make use of the opportunities being offered right now to know more about �ֲ���ý,” she says. “But not to be too hard on themselves — just to have fun.”

Across the Library Quad, Will Jaekle ’21 of Wilson, Wyo., and his parents, Laurie and Don, enjoy their lunch on a grassy slope. By the time he finished checking in at Commons, the Orientation crew already carried his things to the hall outside his room in Rand Hall.

“They were really fast. I saw my dad leaving, and I thought they just asked him to go find a parking spot, and I’d have to carry it,” he said.

How is the family feeling at this point? “Good,” says Laurie. “Good,” says Don.

“Nervous,” says Will.

1:01 p.m.

Posing for an after-lunch portrait at the Class of 1910 Gate are Adrian Azari ’21 of Poughkeepsie, N.Y., his father, Hamid, and mother, Christa.

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1:22 p.m.

Director of Athletics Jason Fein snaps a selfie with the Cote family of Wilton, Conn., after his welcoming remarks to student athletes and their families at the Clifton Daggett Gray Athletic Building. Jackson Cote ’21 (center) hopes to row for �ֲ���ý.

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A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., Fein is a �ֲ���ý newcomer, too, arriving from Drew University on July 1. “We’re going through the first year together,” he tells the newest Bobcats. “We’ll be there together.”

Fein’s welcome focuses on an overview of the Bobcat athletic program. “We want the best possible experience for every participant, we want excellence in NESCAC and at the national level, and we want to build community.”

Still, some of Fein and his leadership team’s messages transcended sports, including the importance of students taking responsibility for communicating with their professors and coaches.

Students, says Tommy Verdell, assistant athletic director for compliance, should get in the habit of face-to-face communication with professors and coaches and “get out of the habit of relying on mom or dad to solve your problems. That’s not going to flow here at the college level.”

“We always prefer that communication come from the students because we try, as much as possible to treat them as adults.”

Later in the presentation, Fein returns to that theme. “I ask the parents, before you pick up the phone to call a coach, a dean, an AD, or assistant AD, you check in with your student to see if they have made contact. We always prefer that communication come from the students because we try, as much as possible to treat them as adults.”

That’s not to say that parents should be out of the loop, says presenter Susan Harriman, assistant director of athletics.

In fact, as she tells the students in the audience, now is the time to up your texting game. “Part of how family members support each other comes from communicating. So, teach your family members how to text. And then you need to send them texts. Otherwise they call us and say they haven’t heard from you in 24 hours!”

That’s the takeaways says Fein as he concludes the greeting. “Text your mom and tell her what’s going on. She worries.”

1:26 p.m.

After a busy morning of moving in, Sarah Abbott ’21 of Bethlehem, N.H., and her father, Ken Abbott, take a few minutes to chill in inflatable chairs outside of Commons, courtesy of the OWL Hub.

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1:41 p.m.

Miles Lamberson ’19 of Hinesburg, Vt., gives two thumbs up after fitting Noah Loughlin ’21 of Mililani, Hawaii, with a backpack during the AESOP equipment check-out at Chase Hall. Loughlin will be participating in the Franconia trip.

Theophil/Sylso

2:16 p.m.

If parents wonder how their student will find work that gives them meaning in life, find the answer during a presentation on Purposeful Work by Rebecca Fraser-Thill, lecturer in psychology and director of faculty engagement and outreach for the college’s Purposeful Work program.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

In the Olin Concert Hall, Fraser-Thill explains how Purposeful Work programming guides students as they explore and then define their interests and abilities, with the ultimate goal of finding work that affords a sense of purpose.

“We are encouraging our students to feel purposeful in the classroom, on the athletic fields, in the community — in all of their endeavors throughout the academic year and into the summer and beyond,” she says.

The Class of 2021 is the first cohort to find Purposeful Work programming fully in place at �ֲ���ý. They’ll have a four-year experience of funded internships, courses infused with real-world applications, practioner-taught Short Term courses, and the ever-popular How to Adult series.

“It’s the perfect time to be here and perfect time to capitalize on everything we have to offer,” she says.

3:15 p.m.

Tiffany Cervantes ’21 of New Haven, Conn., and Erick Gredonia ’21 of North Hollywood, Calif., search the aisles of the Walmart across the river in Auburn — he for shampoo (success), she for a cactus for her room (nope: the store’s plants had withered away, according to the store associate staffing the section).

The dorms are, of course, hubs of �ֲ���ý activity on Opening Day, but so is the Walmart. Throughout the day, cars with license plates from around the country stream in and out as families pick up what they need.

Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College

The Opening Day schedule includes a van shuttle to Walmart for those without their own transportation. After arriving, the students scatter into the store, and Mamta Saraogi ’21 of Kolkata, India, locates the flatware she wants for her room.

First-years are not the only �ֲ���ý students doing last-minute shopping. A few aisles over, a group of student AESOP outdoor trip leaders look for clothing, props, and art supplies. They’re going skating at the Rollodrome tonight, and each pair has to come in coordinated costumes. Katrina Muñoz ’18 and Riley Ewing ’18, both of Bedford, N.H., are going as a firefighter and a dalmatian.

Ewing, beaming, rounds a corner to find Muñoz. “Our hats make noise!” he declares, holding up a pair of beeping and flashing fire hats.

4:26 p.m.

A parent dabs her eyes during President Spencer’s welcome on the Historic Quad in front of Coram Library.

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In her remarks, Spencer spoke as a mother, recalling the day she helped her son, Will, move in at New York University, and the tears that she shed that day.

“Granting the variability of life with a teenager…I was saying goodbye to a person who had been a constant in my life and in the life of our family for 18 solid years. The feeling was inescapable that the project of raising this child was certainly not finished — Lord knows! — but somehow the terms of the undertaking had just changed irrevocably.”

But, she added, “most of all, I think, my tears were the product of that X-ray vision that is our special burden as parents.”

That special vision, she said, “causes us to look at our accomplished, poised, and loving children and see straight through to the fears and frailties that we know are there, and that we know still have the power to cause pain and sorrow and hurt to these creatures we love beyond all reason.”

4:44 p.m.

Starkia Benbow of Boston comforts her 13-year-old daughter Takiyah Walker during Spencer’s welcome.

Walker was sad that her older sister, Tiauna Walker ’21 of Millbury, Mass., was moving away from home. “They are best friends,” says Benbow.

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4:49 p.m.

Dylan Simon ’21 of San Francisco receives a heartfelt hug from her father, Beau Simon, as the day concludes on the Historic Quad.

Her mother, Daphne Stannard, says, “It’s always been a parental task to kick the bird out of the nest. It’s really hard to do this, but we are really proud. We know she’s going to have a great four years here.”

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5:04 p.m.

Following the president’s welcome, Ben Klafter ’21 of New York, N.Y., hugs his mother, Nancy Kestenbaum, during the Farewell Reception and Family Goodbye, held on the Library Terrace.

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5:11 p.m

Jason Seeger ’21 of Belmont, Mass., embraces his mother Kim Seeger during the Farewell Reception and Family Goodbye in the Library Terrace.

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7:20 p.m.

And then it was almost over. Atop Mount David, members of the Class of 2021 gather to watch their first sunset as �ֲ���ý students. But really, it’s just beginning.

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One Saturday night, a student on the fourth floor of Parker Hall heard a man yelling at a woman. Despite the unknowns of the situation, he left the comforts of his bed, ventured outside, and broke up the argument.

Why was this student motivated to leave his room? How did he have the skills to intervene between two people he didn’t know? The answer: He is Green Dot–certified.

Geared toward students, Green Dot is a national bystander intervention program that seeks to prevent power-based violence. It was launched at �ֲ���ý a year ago by Student Affairs staff member Blake Reilly and former staffer Qiu Fogarty.

Assistant Director of Residence Life Blake Reilly, who has spearheaded the deployment of Green Dot at �ֲ���ý, talks with students during a special Green Dot dinner held during the program’s launch in fall 2015.

Since then, 1,500 current �ֲ���ý students have attended an overview workshop of about 90 minutes, and an additional 389 are Green Dot Grads who have completed a five-hour certification training session. In addition, 43 Green Dot Grads in the Class of 2016 have taken their training into the world with them.

Such strong participation reflects a core tenet of the program: It takes a large number of willing and able people to change behaviors. “It’s not one person doing one big thing. It’s a bunch of people doing small things that add up,” says Reilly, assistant director of residence life in Student Affairs.

Reilly has worked hard to grow the program, and the �ֲ���ý community has been “enthusiastic,” he says.

Growing both awareness and the number of trained participants are key elements of the Green Dot program. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

“Green Dot has taken off because it aligns so closely with �ֲ���ý’ core values,” he says. “In our mission and in our community, those informal values that we have, where we are always looking out for another student or staff member, Green Dot just seamlessly fits right into there.”

was founded 10 years ago at the University of Kentucky by Dorothy Edwards, a clinical psychologist, and Marigail Sexton, a communications professional, and is now used by more than 500 U.S. colleges and universities. And it’s not limited to colleges. Even the .

�ֲ���ý has been a particularly active Green Dot campus under Reilly’s leadership. On Sept. 18, �ֲ���ý was one of 50 colleges that joined “Connecting the Dots,” a Green Dot day of action “that trained thousands of students at the same time on the same day,” he says.

So how did that student in Parker Hall know what to do? “Our goal is for students to leave their training feeling empowered to take initiative and be proactive,” says Reilly, one of eight faculty and staff who are Green Dot trainers. “One of the Green Dot cornerstones is that everyone in the community has a responsibility and the ability to prevent power-based personal violence.”

“In a situation where someone thought they couldn’t make a difference before, they now have the skills, tools, and power to act,” he adds. “They will also leave knowing that they now can be part of a cultural shift that changes norms so fewer of our friends, loved ones, and colleagues will be harmed.”

As the program’s name suggests, a green dot is a positive action that confronts a red dot, which is any sort of high-risk situation, whether an incident at a party where alcohol is present or a nasty text message sent to an ex.

A green dot can be reactive, like when the Parker student intervened in that argument, or proactive, when a student strikes up a conversation about power-based violence with a friend. The idea is to fill your community with green dots.

Students are the engine of this �ֲ���ý vehicle for preventing power-based violence.

Green Dot participant James Karsten ’17 of East Grand Rapids, Mich., had been involved with ReMasc, a student organization that challenges traditional ideas about masculinity with a goal of ending sexual violence on college campuses.

“I have internalized the fundamental principles of the training in such a way that I feel enabled and equipped to be an effective bystander during social events here on campus,” Karsten says, who was one of three leaders of the 2016 edition of AESOP, the college’s outdoor program during Orientation.

James Karsten ’17, at left with fellow AESOP trip leaders Audrey Puleio ’17 and Nate Diplock ’17 in August, was an early Green Dot Grad. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

Helene Sudac ’19 of Lake Forest, Ill., is another of the 389 Green Dot grads. Now a Green Dot steering committee member, she values the program’s effectiveness in raising awareness about power-based violence.

“Any type of prevention for power-based violence is important, especially on a college campus where [power-based violence] is unfortunately more common than we know or is reported,” says Sudac, who is a member of the Student Life staff as a junior advisor in Rand Hall.

A �ֲ���ý sociology study last winter shows that the program works.

Reilly and his Green Dot committee teamed up with Associate Professor of Sociology Heidi Taylor’s research methods class and found that students who attended the five-hour training were 50 percent more likely than untrained students to perform a proactive green dot.

Leanne Ouimet of the �ֲ���ý Communications Office is among more than 560 faculty and staff who have received some sort of Green Dot training. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ���ý College)

“We also found that the certified students were 10 percent more likely to intervene when they witnessed a red dot than those who had only attended an overview,” Reilly says.

�ֲ���ý faculty and staff also take part in Green Dot. Three hundred and forty faculty and staff have been trained in a 45-minute overview, and 222 more completed a two-hour training program.

A member of the �ֲ���ý Communications staff, Leanne Ouimet is a Green Dot Grad who hires and helps to supervise the BCO student workers. She sought out Green Dot training because “I want to support our students, whether they work here for a semester or for four years,” she says.

“If they reach out to me, I want to be prepared to help.”

“One in four women and one in six men will be survivors of sexual assault in their lives. That’s a really high number of people getting hurt,” Reilly says. “And whether it’s purposeful or inadvertent, we as a society have been maintaining these high rates of violence.

“So let’s all get involved to bring these rates of violence down.”