This editors’ note is featured in the 2020 Freshman special issue.
Dear Class of 2024,
OK, we’re just gonna say it — this is a little weird.
Previous years’ freshman issue letters waxed poetic about editors’ memories of Trips and moving in. This letter will not do so — it, like much else at Dartmouth, will be different this fall, made different by a new global paradigm.
The theme of this year’s freshman issue is “Disruption.” We hope to strike the balance between acknowledging things have changed and recognizing that those changes are temporary — with an emphasis on the latter.
We know that you’ve been reading about “unprecedented times” and “uncharted waters” since March, and we have no doubt that you’re tired of it. We are too, as both journalists and students, which is why we think it’s important to note here that the fundamentals of your freshman year at Dartmouth will be, at the basic level, just the same as ours were.
It will still be awkward starting classes, unsure of what time to enter the (physical or Zoom) classroom (the answer is that you’re worrying about it too much). You’ll still get lost walking around campus trying to find this building people keep mentioning called “Sanborn.” And the last 15 minutes of your early morning lecture will still flow like cold maple syrup.
Just as with every class before you, your freshman year — and the rest of your Dartmouth experience — will be what you make of it. You have a home here at the College with the rest of us, a home that is excited to welcome you to the wilds of New Hampshire and to the wider Dartmouth community. Your class will be defined not by what happens around you, but by what you do with your time here.
You are not the class of COVID-19 — you are the Dartmouth Class of 2024. And we can’t wait to meet you.
Sincerely, and with love,
Kyle, Lorraine, Gabrielle and Hannah
