I am also very pleased to see my freshman S is really happy at Yale. He told me that Yale brought out funky (or a similar word, cannot really remember) side of him. 
@tonymom There are vacation rentals but only along the shore. Many of them are not set up for winter so they are limited to seasons and you might find better results near Old Saybrook and Clinton. I am sure that the Air B&B is a thing around there but I would be very specific as to where you decided to stay. Not all neighborhoods over there are good for staying if you don’t know where you are driving. It might just be better to rely on a hotel off the train line instead of taking the chance. If you are looking for a rental on the shore for a reunion- stay along the shore. That would be your best bet.
@Faulkner1897 I can attest to the fact that the kids will still keep the conversations easy to join. I happened to be dropping things off to her yesterday on my way to the train station and there were so many kids just grouping and talking and playing on the grass of her RC. It was so great to see everyone getting along. Come to find out they were gathering for the Freshman pep rally. They were all Freshman that were getting along like that.
Good luck to her and A Capella rush… that in itself is very exciting (my daughter is in one of those singing groups and her Rush period was one of the highlights of her freshman year last year). There are so many different kinds of groups and music that they sing. The rush period reminds me of when I joined a sorority in college. Best of luck to her!!
Curious if anyone’s kid has taken Latin at Yale (or if alum have)…?
Edited…decided that it is something that my daughter needs to figure out!
@tonymom my daughter did last year. It was actually the second time she taking Latin five. They would not count her University of Connecticut credits so she had to take the college credit again. She said that the material was all the same but presented differently so it took her a little bit of adjustment to get used to that. She was in a class of all graduate students but she’s glad that she took it because now her language requirement is filled.
Here’s an update on the package I mailed last Tuesday. I mailed a small box (with tracking) on Tuesday. Package was delivered to Yale station at 8:30 am on Thursday. Texted my daughter to let her know, and she went to pick it up Thursday afternoon just before 5 pm. No package. Gave Yale station the benefit of the doubt since it is probably overwhelmed with packages at this time of year. She forgot to check over the weekend, and went this afternoon. One of her Amazon boxes made it, but the package I sent is nowhere to be found. I have a tracking number that shows it was delivered to her PO Box. The PO employee asked her to manually write down the tracking number and “they will keep looking for it”.
Also, when she ordered from Amazon, she used the street addressing function (no PO mentioned, used # instead) but it would not accept her specific 4 digit PO add on to the zip code, so she accepted the generic one and it seemed to work fine. Part 1 of the Amazon shipment arrived Friday (via UPS), and it was there when she went in this afternoon. Part 2 was delivered this morning to Yale station but it has not appeared yet.
A quote from my daughter: “Now I see why everyone says the PO Box at Yale is horrible”.
I’m amazed since I actually used USPS and there are still problems!!!
@Faulkner1897 , I once sent a “guaranteed overnight delivery” package to Yale that took days to be provided to DS. I asked for a refund, but I did not have the original paper receipt, so no refund. I did have a photo of the receipt (that’s how I advise DS of tracking numbers), and my local PO could see that the package wasn’t delivered within the guaranteed window, but no dice. It wasn’t the money as much as not wanting to be abused, but c’est la vie.
DS likes his apartment, has built a lot of IKEA furniture, and I love the feeling that what I send him will be received by him in a timely manner.
If you like conspiracy theories, perhaps this is a deep game to force students to buy books at the Yale bookstore rather than online :))
There is nothing irreplaceable in the package, but it is annoying nonetheless, particularly since this is 3+ days post delivery! I kept the original paper receipt just in case. So glad I did. I sent my daughter a screen shot of the tracking online for further evidence.
She is pretty calm about things and is always willing to give people the benefit of the doubt, but there is a book in the 2nd Amazon package (tracking says delivered to Yale Station this morning) that she needs for a class on Wednesday, so I can see her irritation level increasing. Also, I forgot to report that the PO Box is now $70 - they increased the price.
Good to hear your son likes his apartment!
My daughter (when a student there) was trying to save (me) money by buying books at Amazon, but I told her to just get the books at the bookstore as my blood pressure was getting raised by the ridiculousness of the Yale PO. She didn’t care that much, but when I’m paying $$$$$ for her education, I wasn’t going to quibble over another tens of dollars for books on time!
I told my daughter the same thing, especially this first semester. She bought some of her books at the bookstore, but they were sold out of a bunch of books already so she ordered on Amazon last Wednesday. Mainly literature type books, it appears. She was also in a freshman seminar that was abruptly canceled due to low enrollment and had to change to a different class, which is maybe why the books for the new class were already gone.
If she gets desperate she can buy the book in ibooks or go to the library and see if they have a copy. I keep thinking that if she had rented a box at the UPS store, she would have had these items minutes after delivery…
So sounds like doing the UPS store or ordering through FedEx to be picked up at the store is best option? Was just about to do a care package now I’m not sure it would get there 
My daughter’s birthday is August 31, which her freshman year was the first day of classes. I made homemade brownies. Needless to say, by the time she got them, they were not exactly “fresh”
I checked the price on FedEx Ground vs USPS for the tiny package I sent. I have a discount on FedEx since I have an account, but I don’t think you need anything special to create an account. Anyway, the price was $7.75 FedEx, $6.95 USPS. I knew I should have done FedEx but I wanted to test out USPS. Honestly, I am not sure if this particular issue is the method of delivery - I think the package is simply buried in some room somewhere. The package notification slip was in my daughter’s PO Box. They just could not find the package. The entire set up is hugely inefficient, especially when they have a large volume of packages at certain times of the year.
Others on this thread have said that the Prospect Street package address for UPS and FedEx works very well.
(Your Name)
Yale University - College Name
135 Prospect St.
New Haven, CT 06511
In the future, I am probably going to use FedEx ship to store, and have my daughter pick up at the FedEx near TD. Next year, my daughter will almost certainly use the UPS store box.
I am going to remain optimistic that the package I sent will actually be found at some point! It will be interesting to see when.
I actually only had a problem with Yale post office once over 8 years of use–I know I’m probably a rare one! But for that problem, I actually called and spoke to the Postmaster at Yale Station–and lo and behold, the box was quickly found and into my son’s hands. Now that I am mailing things to places other than Yale for my sons, if something is late or goes missing, I use the email contact on usps website (which sets up a case file). I have found that I have gotten prompt attention by phone or email response, and boxes are usually located. Just today a postmaster from Boston left me a phone message to tell me he had found my box and it was being delivered today.
@donnaleighg @Faulkner1897: I told my son the same thing as well. He said the book he ordered will arrive eventually. Meanwhile, he found an online pdf of an older version of the book as a transitional source for his study.
@Faulkner1897
Thanks for the heads up! Will have kid pick care package up at FedEx store, just easier and will warn family/friends not to send important stuff to US post office.
He is excited to receive care package…from the girlfriend, not mom…go figure 
Just wanted to add that we haven’t had any problems with the Yale post office - guess we are lucky? I just mailed a box USPS on Tuesday and they estimated delivery on Thursday. My son didn’t get over to look until Friday, but he got it without a problem. We had similar success last year, but when he needed a travel visa I actually drove up to Yale because I’ve read too many horror stories. On the other hand, he lived in an off campus apartment over the summer and his grandmother sent him a card with cash in it - that never arrived.
I’m really surprised at just how crazy the shipping options are. We haven’t shipped anything yet to my new graduate student. He has slightly different options than the undergraduates. It seems like our best option (considering all of your frustrations and what I’ve heard from friends) is to ship to his department. I hope packages make it to him. He forgot to change his monthly shipment of Picky Bars (like Power Bars), so those showed up at home. Just slightly too late for the personal delivery service that his grandparents were already providing as they were passing through on their way to Boston (lunch out was part of the deal). They took forgotten items to my friend’s son, too. I’m tempted to start a new FB group for NJ parents, just for small things like that, as I did when he was at Cornell. Though I hope I won’t need it too often. He once left his keys at home as he headed back to Cornell, and another family in that group was able to take them the next day. I’d never met them, but they lived ten minutes from me. People thought a state specific group for parents was silly, but it helped a lot of people (and others joined from different states and even across the pond).
So far, we’ve had great success with USPS. We have Amazon Prime, I placed an order on Wednesday, and she received it on Friday. I dropped the PO in the address, and it was shipped and received with no problems. My wife sent a care package through USPS without issue.