What a spectacular place! From a mom returned

Colleges & Universities University of Notre Dame
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<p>I just returned from Orientation Weekend at the University of Notre Dame. While I shed more than a few tears at the prospect of cutting my oldest one loose from the nest, I was moved and struck and awed and every other emotion at the tremendous feeling of family I got on that campus. This is a place that doesn’t let kids fall through the cracks–a place where a student is not just a number, but a vital part of the institution. The rectors and resident assistants really care.</p>

<p>I say these things as a 1984 ND graduate. Being of the 8th class of women admitted to the university, we were pioneers in a university that, quite frankly, wasn’t fully ready to integrate co-education into the university experience. There were a lot more kids who fell through the cracks back then–as I believe there were at many universities. The way things are set up now, though, is very impressive. I was positively surprised at how much the on-campus atmosphere and social life have improved–and they’ve been able to do this in a way that doesn’t need to include kids passed out in the hallways, nursing hangovers. It’s not a teatotaling campus either–what can I say? It’s just done right.</p>

<p>What came through loud and clear to me was the mission of the University, Fr. Sorin’s dream. And I realized then that their interest in admitting legacies is not financial (our son is a ROTC–no endowment donors are we), but as a means of keeping the vision and traditions alive.</p>

<p>I left the orientation very pumped up, and feeling my son could not have made a better decision. Notre Dame isn’t pretending to keep up with the campus living trends elsewhere–they are setting the moral bar high and leaving it there. Their stated mission is to be a place where kids are educated to be a force of good, to be leaders of the community and beyond.</p>

<p>It’s a mission that works. I am proud to be a part of it. And I am absolutely thrilled that all the values we’ve worked so hard to stress to our son are going to flourish and evolve within a university context which is unafraid and unashamed to cherish its values and keep them alive.</p>

<p>I still miss the kid, though <g>…</g></p>

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<p>My brother graduated in '84, as did my sister’s brother-in-law. My brother’s bike got stolen and he drove my dad’s old golf cart around campus after that. That seems to be the only way people other than his friends remember him!</p>

<p>I think ND’s orientation has to be the best in the country. When we left there two years ago I had no doubts I was leaving my son at the finest university in the country. The closing mass was unbelievable.</p>

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<p>I cried, too! My husband and son pretty much realized by that time that if I was going to be emotional, so be it… They weren’t simple tears of just missing my son and the whole passing of ages thing, but a glimpse into the bigger picture of what the university is and what it stands for–the vision. Where I fit into it; where my son might fit into it. </p>

<p>What I came to understand in that catharsis–with memories flooding me of my own college days, of my son’s growing up, of walking the campus with him when he was a little kid, wondering if the legacy would continue, yet wanting to make sure it was his dream–whatever his dream might be–and not mine–was that Notre Dame is bold and unapologetic in its vision. It has resisted the co-ed dorm. It still has the section in Du Lac barring student fornication, as it did two decades ago when we laughed at it; and no doubt students still do. Yet it is still there. </p>

<p>I think the biggest imagery that hit me was the Dame, Notre Dame, our Lady of the Lake. The Dome always moved me in my undergrad days, but never as much as when we were in the D-6 parking lot getting ready to leave, and I stole one last glimpse of the Golden Dome–this time not as a student, but as a fellow mother. I feel like she watches over it all. And I feel like she always has–even when a student like me, that, for all practical purposes should have fallen through the cracks a million times for all the stupid things I did as an undergrad. Yet I made it nonetheless. </p>

<p>It was very hard to give up my son to go so very far away. And yet, I think the University is a great fit for him, and can summon from within him the very best he has to offer; helping to mold him not only into a man, but into a man of character who has the education and connections and all the rest to garner power and influence, and to use it for good.</p>

<p>I am more sold on the place than I ever have been. And I’m an alumni! Perhaps mine was the cathartic moment of the Footsteps Prayer, when I realized my own rocky road through college was not the university’s fault, but that it was the university’s belief in valuing every single student that kept me going so that I would have a parchment on the wall, and that, someday, my son will, too.</p>

<p>I believe in that vision! Certainly, the world needs help. And the class of 2009 looks prime to be part of the solution, rather than the problem.</p>

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<p>By the way, Doc Mom, who were your brother and brother-in-law from class of '84?</p>

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<p>I’ll pm you.</p>

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<p>I know how you feel, ddjones! We left our oldest child at ND on Sunday for his freshman year, and while it was definitely one of the harder experiences of my life, I know we’re doing the right thing for him.</p>

<p>My son is one of those kids who “had an ND monogram on his diaper”, as the provost said. Many of my husband’s relatives went to ND, as did my husband. I’m a SMC grad. This was the one school my son always wanted to go to, and the day the manila envelope came was a VERY happy day.</p>

<p>We live in the south, and obviously ND is not a big name down here. We have had people question us as to why we’re spending so much money to send him there, especially when we have two more children right behind him. It’s hard to explain to anyone not associated with ND how we feel about the place, or what a great, Catholic, education we feel he will get there (Mass on Sunday was incredible!). After seeing the film “The Spirit of Notre Dame” on Saturday at the end of that orientation session, I think my husband and I were ready to sacrifice anything necessary the next 8 years so that all our children can go there. </p>

<p>So as badly as I feel about my son being almost a 10-hour drive from home, I am overjoyed that he has the chance to have this experience. Even if we can never make it clear to anyone else, it’s crystal clear to us what makes ND such a special place.</p>

<p>(By the way, during Mass on Sunday, as luck would have it, our son sat in the row right in front of us. If you saw a woman sobbing and wiping her eyes with toilet paper (lost my Kleenex!) during most of the Mass, it was probably me. I think I made the man next to me very nervous!)</p>

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<p>If you saw the woman sobbing and wiping her eyes without the benefit of toilet paper or Kleenex (shouldn’t I have known better?), it was probably me!</p>

<p>As I sat at that incredibly moving mass, I thought of how many masses I’d sat through at his grade school and high school…the continuum of it all, and yet this step transcends them all. It was a cathartic moment for me. For all my own years of Catholic education, then my son’s (and his siblings), there have been time when the standardized ritual seemed so canned and automatic, but in the JACC that day, it seemed unifying and whole. No matter how far apart we are in the country–or the world–we are sharing the same liturgy. </p>

<p>I was the first of the ND tradition, but my husband and I took our family up to Notre Dame Family Hall many summers, almost a pilgrimage of sorts; a chance–once you get over the twin beds with zero padding and the lack of a/c in July–to reflect on the events of the past year. We never pushed it–particularly because we never thought we could afford it–but I think it was in our son’s head for a long time. I think it’s in our daughter’s (a junior), too, as well as our youngest (a third grader). Like you, we’ve decided that, if that’s what we want, we’ll do what it takes to make it happen…and it will be well worth it…</p>

<p>Glad to hear I wasn’t the only sobber in the bunch!</p>

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<p>dd: I told my husband that the only other person I saw crying on Sunday was a dad! Glad to know we weren’t the only ones. </p>

<p>You all sound a lot like us. We have a senior in high school and a freshman, and guess where they would like to go? The day our son got accepted, we were wildly excited. That night my husband and I lay in bed and thought “Now how do we pay for this?” Luckily, the financial aid office came through for us - for this year. We don’t know what we’ll do next year with two kids in college - but we’re just going to have to take it a day at a time. At least you’ve got some space in between yours!</p>

<p>I almost wish I could have had a videotape of that Mass on Sunday - the music was spectacular, and I really didn’t enjoy it as much as I could have because I was such a soggy mess. </p>

<p>Just curious - what dorm is your son in?</p>

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<p>Hi dd! I remember you from last year when you were waiting for word if your son was admitted. Freshman orientation is so great. We just got back about an hour ago from dropping our daughter off ( a nice long 1200 mile ride) - she’s a sophomore now - but we did see quite a few of the kids doing the orientation activities on Sunday when we were moving her stuff. There was one girl, standing outside talking on her cell phone to probably a friend, repeating, this is awesome, this is just so awesome! Brought a smile to my face because that describes Notre Dame to a “t”. </p>

<p>I think it was actually harder leaving her this time than freshman year. We all went to mass at the Basilica before we started moving her in. At the end of mass, she saw some friends, and the transition was something else - it was like a light switch turned on - during mass she was still with us in summertime - at the end of mass, she was completely and fully back at her second home. </p>

<p>I cried buckets during freshman orientation as well! The mass was so moving… so emotional… the entire orientation was great. D said last night’s opening mass for the semester, the party on the quad afterwards, and the fireworks were great as well. </p>

<p>Funny thing - she kept most of her stuff in storage during the summer but we still had a car full of new stuff on the way up and a car full on the way home of things she didn’t need this year. </p>

<p>I miss her so much already! We should have a parents group where we can talk when we are really missing our kids.</p>

<p>I’m glad everything went so smoothly for all the freshman and ya’ll had a great time! Welcome to the family! :)</p>

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<p>Yes, jp23, that music was spectacular! The communion meditation solo had me bawling buckets… I’ll bet there were more than us crying in there, it’s just that our eyes were so full up we couldn’t see them!</p>

<p>My son is in Fisher Hall, and we are thrilled with it. They’ve redone it beautifully with lots of common space, and his dorm room–for a freshman–was really big, with four thermal windows across the whole western wall, facing the courtyard with Pangborn (now a girls’ dorm, hard to get used to that, but I think my son already has <g>). The location is great, next to the dining hall, the Rock and right on South Quad. I’ve tried to tell him the Lyons girls are best (yes, I’m biased!), but he appeared to keep quite an open mind over orientation weekend.</g></p>

<p>Having been there with the eighth class of women, I can say without a doubt that the campus social atmosphere is a thousand percent improved. It’s as if the women have been there forever. Everything about the place is improved. A lot of people will remember Fr. Malloy’s legacy as the incredible number of gorgeous huge buildings in gothic architectural style. His biggest legacy, though, is the atmosphere he has brought to the campus. Once upon a time, the alcoholism rates among students and alumni were astronomical, and student reviews rated the campus social life as sub-par. With typical Notre Dame vision, the university set out to create a healthy social atmosphere–and, as far as I can tell, they’ve had tremendous success with it. Fr. Malloy has had a real interest in student life, particularly the integration of women on campus not just in enrollment numbers, but as a part of the fiber of the university–both students and alumni. Now it’s on to Fr. Jenkins…</p>

<p>Financially, things have worked out well with Navy ROTC. After the second day of orientation–a mini “boot camp”–he and his cohorts were secretly plotting how they could escape the Navy thing. By the time we arrived on campus on Thursday, he’d already made a few dozen of the kind of friends you can only make so quickly when you’ve been through hell together! It’s a good fit…</p>

<p>I can’t imagine sending off my daughter–I only have one. It was hard enough to send off my oldest, much less my shopping and late night conversation partner. And yet, if there’s any place I would feel comfortable sending her 450 miles away, it’s Notre Dame. Now, it’s a matter of if she gets in and if we can afford it. I figure that whatever happens will be as God wills it…</p>

<p>We do need a support group for these online moms who have begun to clear out the nest! To think, just six months or so ago, we were worried about whether or not they’d get in the place–now that they’re gone, we miss them!</p>

<p>As I told my son, my tears were not because I have any reservations whatsoever that he will thrive there or that he is in good hands, but more as an emotional whirlwind of watching him grow up into the next phase of life…as my husband and I begin to move into the next phase of ours. Alas, with God’s Little Surprise around (the third grader, of course! <g>), we’ll have plenty of time in this phase <g>…</g></g></p>