When you hear about a student trailblazer in the Northeast Kingdom, you probably think of mountain climbing or trekking through the woods. I am a different kind of trailblazer, but my experience was still adventurous. In May, I found myself living in a Lyndon dorm, not knowing a single person, with no car, no food service, and no student ID.
I am a student in the Northern Vermont University@Northern Essex Community College (NECC) program. I live in Massachusetts, take classes on the NECC Haverhill campus, and take NVU classes live via Zoom conferencing. I earned my associates degree at NECC and I am working on a BA in Graphic Art thru NVU.
Haverhill, a city of about 60,000 people, 35 miles north of Boston, is very urban with traffic, lots of shopping, restaurants, and cultural diversity. It is completely different from Lyndonville.
In April, I visited the Lyndon campus as part of a class I was taking. While wandering around trying to find my classroom, I spied a poster for a one-week Puppetry class being offered in May. I jokingly thought I might take the class, but the joke was on me because it fit a requirement and my schedule worked; I signed up. No other NECC student had ever taken a summer class at Lyndon.
My advisor helped me reserve space in a dorm. I have never lived in a dorm, but it sounded like fun, until I learned there was no food service and I would not have a car. Then there was the matter of not having a student ID. For some strange reason, the college required me to move into the dorm on the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend when my class didn’t start until Tuesday.
Just try to get a student ID on a holiday weekend after graduation! Security didn’t know what to do with me and the RAs were at a complete loss. Without an ID, simple things like getting in and out of the building were a problem. After a whole afternoon of messages and phone calls, I became official with a temporary ID.
Never having lived in a dorm, I was not sure what to expect, but I guess I was expecting some sort of orientation. Why else would they make me come three days before the class started? All I got was a warning about damaging my room. My family had driven me the 2½ hours up to Lyndon and they took me food shopping. We also grabbed menus from local pizza places that delivered. At least I would not starve.
I felt like I had been dropped on another planet. No one in my dorm suite even said hello. They spent most of the time in their rooms with the doors shut. The RAs locked the office and posted a note saying where to find them in an emergency. I guess they assumed I knew my way around. There were no campus maps, no explanations on where to find the student lounge, or vending machines. The campus was a ghost town.
Memorial Day weekend seemed to last forever, and the temperature climbed to 90 degrees, which did not help. I survived the longest weekend of my life sitting alone in a dorm room thanks to my laptop, my connection to the outside world.
When Tuesday finally arrived, I was thrilled to start my Puppetry class. It was a great experience. I loved Robby Gilbert (the instructor), learned a lot, and made new friends that tried to convince me to move to Vermont and enroll full time, but they were all locals and not living in the dorms. The days were great—the nights were long and lonely.
When I got back to Massachusetts, I shared my experience with Kristen Hunt, Site Director of Northern Vermont University@NECC. It was Kristen who called me a “trailblazer.” I hope that sharing my experience will help make positive changes and pave the way for other NECC students to “Do North” by taking summer courses in the future.