My journey at Stockton started during the summer of 2013. While all other high school graduates were enjoying in the sun, my college life had already begun. I was enrolled at Stockton as an EOF (Educational Opportunity Fund) student. It is a program that helps students who need help financially. And all the EOF kids had to do five weeks of schooling at Stockton during the summer. These five weeks of fun, stress, joy, pain and many more emotions started on 29th June, 2013.
On the first day we were assigned our dorm mates and dorm rooms and had a medical done. It was an easy beginning. We had an evening meeting on the first day where we got our schedule for the next five weeks. As soon as we saw morning workouts starting at 5:00 am after two days everyone sighed. Also, we had to take a standardized test for the placement in appropriate classes the next day (Yes, we had to take two classes during those five weeks). During the first evening meeting itself every student present there knew, it was not going to be easy.
The food served during the first few days at N-wing (college cafeteria) was very appetizing and everybody used to devour the food. But as soon as early morning workouts started and the classes started, the N-wing food became monotonous and everyone started missing their home food. After first weekend when everyone come came back, everyone brought tons of food with them. All the dorm rooms were stocked with home food, chips and canned food.
The classes weren’t hard but after the early morning workouts, it was a pain. We also had lights out and curfew during our stay. Doing all the homework during lights out without being caught was the best part of EOF. People used to hide in closets and finish their homework with the cell phone torches (sounds weir but it was fun). If lights were found to be on after lights out by any of the coordinator, everyone on that floor would be called down to dips (even if it was midnight).
As all of us were going through the same kind of pain, EOF students became a family. People on the same floor would make sure no one was late for the workouts, pull all nighters together in the common room, share the home cooked food and many other things. EOF was a lots of fun as well. We went to six flags, went out to bowling arcade and also went to see a Shakespeare play. It was a lot of fun!
I met so many great people and made great friends. Learned a lot about how to survive college in those five weeks. These were some of the best college days. Haleigh Sockwell, another honors student and very good friend of mine shared this experience with me. I surely miss EOF days even today.