by William Lewandowski

lewandowwi@mnstate.edu

When someone brings up MSUM, so much comes to mind. I imagine the beautiful buildings like Weld and Livingston Lord Library. I feel the closeness and the community of our wonderful campus. I think of the joy  I feel just taking a step onto the quad.

There are so many positive things about being on a small campus like MSUM or M-State. The coziness, the size of campus and the community we have just makes the experience of a little campus that much better.

Large campuses don’t have much of this since the length of the college can span for many blocks, the sense of community can be engulfed, and making a mixture of friends can be hard due to class sizes being in the hundreds.

My senior year of high school, I started taking night classes at M-State. I liked how easy it was to get to class and how calm the building was at 4 p.m. The class size was about twenty people, and I enjoyed everything about it. Everyone got to know each other by name and everyone made friends with nearly everyone. It really got me amped for college the following year.

When I was applying for colleges, I realized something with my choices: All the campuses were small. For some reason, between Valley City State University and MSUM, these two were so appealing to me.

The true reason for choosing MSUM didn’t hit me until the first day of freshman year. The first week before school and the first week of school all hit me like a brick. Both colleges were small and things were so communal. It felt like a home more than a school.

MSUM is such a warm and cozy school, even when it isn’t so warm outside. For those who live on campus, getting from the dorms to classes only takes a few minutes. Going from class to class is a quick trip as well, which is especially wonderful when the wind chill drops below zero and snow hills are taller than the average student.

The quickness between classes and buildings all contribute to the sense of closeness and aid the feeling of being more at home. All the students and staff around and moving about makes it feel like a community. On a campus like ours that is only a few blocks long, there are many opportunities to see friendly faces and strike up a pleasant conversation.

Although we have places like Roland Dille Center for the Arts, which is mainly made up of music and theater students, or Weld, which is primarily English students, it is common to see interaction between people of different majors within each building.

Most important to this sense of community is just that, being able to make friends in other majors. I talked to a friend of mine, who is a recent alum, about NDSU to get more insight for my article. They said, “It was much easier to make friends in my major or similar majors.”

For Dragons, I have found it is so much easier to make friends from various majors. So many great opportunities make it possible to make a vast number of different friends. The first year experience course was a great place I made friends in. Some of my generals, like English 101, bowling and band, were outstanding places for me to meet new people and make new friends. MSUM also has great clubs, programs and events to go to that create fantastic grounds for finding diverse friends.

For me, reaching out to a professor about leadership opportunities alone has found me new friends. Education Minnesota Student Program has helped me find friends within the education program. Also, going to events such as the movie nights in Langseth and welcome week events was a great place for me to find new friends. I have friends who are music majors, psychology majors, social work majors and even paralegal majors, and I’m a communication arts and literature major.

Being on a beautiful and close campus is such a benefit to those who choose to be here. Having a sense of a home and community, being close, and being able to have a diverse mixture of friends helps the college years become more exciting and fun experience. I am proud to be a Dragon.