Freshman counselors: come and feel the love

Junior

By Ethan Guillen

In my younger days, I lived in a blessed home where my parents left me to my own devices. I came and went as I pleased, and no one told me what to do. So when I was looking at schools, I was fearful of ending up somewhere with Residential Advisors (RA) who would continually watch over me, waiting to strike the next time I felt like bouncing down the hall naked on a pogo stick screaming, "Viva la lucha!" But fate was kind and sent me to RA-free Yale.

EUGENE WONG/YH

Yale has wisely chosen not to have a paternalistic RA system. Though freshman counselors have some responsibility to watch over the newly arrived generation of Yalies (like making sure that they make it to DUH and that their water bongs aren't used to prop entryway doors open), the discipline is left to the Dean of each college. This minimization of the disciplinary role allows counselors and counselees to make incredible bonds by engendering trust in the relationship. And even better, because Yale treats us like responsible folk, we tend to act more responsibly.

I met my frosh counselor, Jenny, the first day that I arrived. She was amazing and really made freshman year great for everyone in our group. With her guidance, we made it through registration, roommate problems, romance issues, and everything else that a frosh could encounter. Even better, she never once handed us a citation like the ones my brother had adorning his wall at a state school, where he lived under the hawkish eyes of an RA.

There are, of course, a few counselors who make little effort to imbue their counselees' lives with tender loving care. But to counter this, there is a fairly stringent application and interview process to get rid of all the bad seeds. Also, being a frosh counselor is a huge commitment, so one can be fairly certain that only those who are really dedicated will apply. Hell, you have to have someone really dedicated to give up the right to pick up on the fresh meat that arrives in September.

But for those of us willing to make the sacrifice, the payoffs are immense. The opportunity to help frosh through their first year and experience Yale through unjaded, uncynical eyes is amazing. It's like reliving that first day when you walked through Phelps Gate and knew you were going to spend four amazing years here. 

Ethan Guillen is a junior in Berkeley.

Sophomore

By Nathan Littlefield

Our closet contained $200 worth of liquor in plastic handles. We'd just returned from the liquor store and gotten the booze in order, so we called our freshman counselor, as we were required to do before a party. He took a look in the closet, laughed, and said we were in good shape. He reminded us to be careful, told us the counselor on duty that night, and let us know that he'd be there if there were any problems.

The party went off without a hitch. In the morning, our counselor stopped by to survey the devastated common room, asked how the night had gone, and let us know that he and the other freshman counselors were serving pizza that Monday.

This scenario repeated itself—usually with a smaller budget—several times during that year. In my experience, it exemplifies everything good about Yale's freshman counseling system.

"But hold on," some might object. "You just think the system was great because you could drink. Wasn't your counselor irresponsible?" Paradoxically, he wasn't.

Yale freshman counselors are more concerned with supporting students than with ferreting out rule breakers. They're there if you need to talk to them, but, unlike at some colleges—Boston College (BC) and Harvard come to mind—they aren't checking your cup. Harvard's "line of sight" drinking policy means that any underage student an RA sees drinking is liable for discipline. And the draconian alcohol policy instituted a few years ago at BC in response to the college's growing reputation as a party school means that a trip to the keg could result in lost housing privileges and probation.

Strangely enough, Harvard and BC's prohibition of undergraduate drinking seems to have caused more problems than it solved. During one visit to Harvard, my host's roommate came back to the suite with a liter of Jack Daniel's and two friends. The three proceeded to empty the bottle in about 20 minutes, at which point they stumbled off to catch a train to Boston. Friends of mine at both schools tell me this is standard practice. Despite administrative promises of no-questions-asked medical care, they fear seeking help in an emergency, lest the event provoke scrutiny from RAs.

Though Yalies are no teetotalers, we haven't hit wino territory yet—and we have the Administration's tacit leniency toward underage drinking to thank. People drink at college. No college can—or should—eliminate underaged drinking, but they should make drinking safer. By allowing students to drink, Yale greatly minimizes the number of people pounding liters of bourbon, and if somebody does get a serious case of alcohol poisoning, he can suffer through it in DUH, rather than on a bathroom floor surrounded by friends wondering if they can help him elude the curious RA outside the door. My freshman counselor's reaction to our liquor stash was part of a pattern that helps turn a potentially dangerous incident into an embarrassing story and an instructively painful hangover.

Nathan Littlefield is a sophomore in Ezra Stiles and a managing editor of the Herald.

Freshman

By Katelin Carr

On Fri., Sept. 1 last year, I got grass stains on the butt of my khakis. That day was also my first day at Yale as a fresh-faced, completely clueless member of the class of 2004. The green ass was worth it, though, because in attaining the muddy-cheeked look, I met my frosh counselor Ann as my counseling group and I sat in JE's courtyard. She gave us candy, advice, more candy, and friendship. She presented herself as a peer rather than the sage suggested by her title of "freshman counselor."

To have a "counselor" implies that freshmen need to be counseled due to some pre-existing condition that prevents them from exhibiting normal behavior. Egomaniacs don't like to admit that there might be something wrong with them, and Yale is full of egomaniacs—you've got to think you're pretty hot stuff to apply here in the first place. But the simple fact is that freshmen have problems. We have problems because we're suddenly plunged into a totally alien environment away from our parents, for the first time, among people we've never laid eyes upon in our lives. Who wouldn't have problems in such a situation? We can't behave "normally" in a Yale way because we don't know what the Yale way is yet. This is why we need freshman counselors to show us the way, to set us off in the right direction.

Maybe some frosh are reading this and thinking, "Hey, my frosh counselor didn't show me the way. I found it myself." Well, either such freshmen are extreme egomaniacs, have extremely poor memories, or are extremely lucky to have become so self-reliant so quickly. Most of us—if we push ourselves past the denial stage—will admit that in the first few weeks of fall semester our frosh counselors were a godsend. They showed us the dining hall, signed our course forms, talked to us about anything and everything to do with Yale, and became our friends. But they weren't like those friends we made on FOOT or on the first day of the semester, those people who now call you by name and recite the ages of all your siblings while you swear you've never seen the person in your entire life. Frosh counselors are friends who can be relied upon for the duration of freshman year, not just to talk to you while waiting in line for the ITS packet. My counselor eats dinner with us, talks with us, e-mails us, and bakes us cookies. I know many other counselors who do the same for their freshmen.

Freshman counselors have to undergo a rigorous selection process to get to live downstairs from us in the first place. They're caring, good people—if they weren't, they wouldn't be doing the job.

Most importantly, freshman counselors are more friendly than parental. In essence, they are friends who happen to have been here for three years. They know a thing or two about the Yale way and want to impart this knowledge to us. Our frosh counselors were our primary support network before we created our own among our new friends. Frosh counselors continue to support us whether we take advantage of it or not, and to know that someone genuinely cares cannot be knocked. 

Katelin Carr is a freshman in Jonathan Edwards.

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