In order for you to understand my passion for commuter life, I need to tell you a story. My brother was a commuter student at Geneva. We grew up in Beaver Falls and like a lot of young men, he wanted to go away to college and have some independence. We are first generation college students, so he didn’t know that he should have secured housing before attending a big university. By the time he thought about it, there weren’t any affordable housing options, so he made a late decision to attend Geneva. He lived at home, came to class, and went home. He didn’t get involved in any clubs or sports. Geneva College ended up just being a means to an end. I’m sure as some of you think back onto your college experience, this sounds familiar.

When I started working at Geneva and saw all the options available for college students, I found myself feeling very sad that my brother didn’t take advantage of the opportunities available, and honestly, I don’t think he knew about everything that was available. That’s where my commuter life story starts.

I found myself wanting to help other commuter students understand what is available to them. I unofficially started helping with commuter life by being the communicator about events and services available to them. I found that many of our commuter students didn’t know that they had access to the same services that resident students had such as: Tutoring, Health Services, Counseling, etc. Communicating with commuter students became very important to me.

During Welcome Week now, I have the pleasure of meeting every new commuter student. We meet in our Commuter Lounge and go over questions that I often get (parking on campus, meal plan options, services that they should take advantage of, etc.). I make sure they know where my office is so that if they have any questions while they are on campus, they know they can come to me.

To me, the most important thing for everyone who comes to Geneva is a sense of belonging. I would say that this is even more important for commuter students. I want it to be a place they can look back on and say that they felt welcomed and that they truly were meant to be in this place. I don’t want it to only be a means to an end. I want it to be where they found community, respect and a place to be heard. My hope is for them to consider Geneva their home away from home.