Standing in the bright sunshine with a blue moving cart overflowing with her belongings, University of Pennsylvania first-year Victoria Viera was ready to move into Lauder College House. She and her mother, father, and younger brother had driven to Philadelphia from their home in Miami, stepping onto campus for the first time that crisp and breezy morning.
“I’ve always wanted to be at a university with a beautiful campus and it is stunning, breathtaking. Honestly, I can’t even describe it,” said Viera, who is in the College of Arts and Sciences.
“It’s amazing,” she said about the move-in process. “Everyone has been so helpful. I jumped out of the car to ask for help from the moving team and they were very quick to answer my questions. It’s been very smooth and everyone’s been very welcoming.”
Her family took a moment to reflect on the experience. “It’s surreal. You see it on the horizon, but then one day you wake up and, well, it’s here; she’s embarking on this new chapter,” said her father Carmelo Viera. “I’m still coming to grips with it, in a good way. We’re just really proud, really proud and grateful. She has worked so hard to get here; this is all her doing. I think she is really going to love it.”
Viera is one of 2,409 students in the Class of 2028 expected to arrive this week. Move-In began Monday with international, transfer, exchange, and first-generation students. First-year students are moving in on Tuesday and Wednesday, and from Friday through Sunday, 3,486 returning undergraduates will move into one of Penn’s 13 College Houses. New Student Orientation runs from Aug. 21 to 26, and includes a New Student Resource Fair, Welcome to Penn session, preceptorials, and an outing at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Classes begin on Tuesday, Aug. 27.
Move-In teams dressed in aqua-blue shirts helped to unload vehicles and fill moving carts with suitcases, bags, and bins, the mirrors and rugs sticking out of the top. More than 1,100 red and blue moving carts were available at locations throughout campus, festooned with some of the 55 balloon displays. At tents with “Ask Us” flags were students in light-blue shirts signifying they are with Peers Helping Integrate New Students (PHINS), ready with answers and refreshments.
Not long after Viera and her family headed into Lauder to find her room, Interim President J. Larry Jameson arrived, walking under an arch created by a shiny silver “2028” floating between two red-and-blue balloon towers at the corner of 33rd and Walnut streets.
Greeting him with a hug was the Philadelphia Phillies mascot, the Phanatic, which danced, posed for selfies, and playfully rearranged belongings in passing moving carts to entertain the crowd. The Penn Band played while second-year Anya Stewart twirled a baton.
Jameson greeted faculty and staff and spoke with students and families. He then visited the historic Quadrangle dormitories, which house the largest number of first-year students. The Quad, consisting of three college houses, recently wrapped up its first of three phases of construction.
First-year Rob Igic, from Madison, Wisconsin, and his parents were among the students and families who spoke with Jameson on Tuesday. Igic, who had just moved into Fisher Hassenfeld College House in the Upper Quad, is entering the School of Engineering and Applied Science.
“I talked about how I was excited to be here and he was telling me about all these different cool experiences that people have at Penn,” Igic said about the conversation with Jameson.
“I was kind of nervous before coming here, but now I’m here and it’s a nice day and I’ve gotten to meet a couple of people,” Igic said, adding that he is a member of Penn’s lightweight rowing team. “So I’m starting to feel a lot better now and I’m pretty excited.”
His father, Petar Igic, and mother, Jen Pensotti, both graduated from Penn Engineering in 1994, and both lived in the Quad their first year. “It’s pretty cool to meet the president just as you move in,” Petar Igic said.
Renovation to the Quad’s Riepe College House have been completed. Moving in were twin sisters and first-year students Lauren Watts and Ife Watts from Bronxville, New York, helped by their parents and two younger sisters, also twins. Both Lauren and Ife are in the College; Lauren is pre-med interested in chemistry, and Ife in political science. They are in different rooms in Riepe, separated by only one floor.
Lauren had participated in the Center for Africana Studies Summer Institute in July. “I loved it. It was great,” she said. “It was nice to meet a bunch of people. It took a little bit of the stress off today. It’s nice that I know people already and I can start finding new people.” She was involved in theater and a capella groups in high school and may want to try those at Penn as well, while Ife wants to look into the Kelly Writers House and the Makuu Black Cultural Center.
Their father, Bradford Watts, graduated from the Wharton School in 1997. “I am happy with how it all turned out,” he said about his twin daughters coming to Penn. “I remember there being a very strong community of Black students at the undergrad level.”
First-year Julia Weiner from New York City had just moved into her room at Riepe, helped by her father, Michael Weiner, wearing a “PENN DAD” T-shirt. “It’s thrilling just to be able to have her in such a wonderful place with so much opportunity,” her father said. Her mother, Susan Moss, a 1991 graduate of Wharton, at that moment was running an errand on campus.
“The new dorm is beautiful. Everything is new,” Julia Weiner said, adding that Riepe was her first choice. “It’s all a little overwhelming, because moving into college is overwhelming, but it’s exciting.” Interested in studying psychology and classics in the College, she is planning to become a part of the Penn Hillel community and maybe join a running club.
Also in Riepe, first-year John Moretti had just arrived, bags and bins stacked on one side of his room while the family focused on the challenge of where to put it all, ultimately deciding to get risers to lift the bed higher and make more room underneath.
Moretti and his parents, Tatiana and Frank, and younger sister, Adriana, and brother, Victor, had come from their home in London, stopping in New York and then driving to Philadelphia. All had gone smoothly with the move, his mother said, although they needed to do a bit of shopping, for a lamp, a rug, and a doorstopper.
“Riepe was my first choice because I’ve been told the Quad is a great place to live, and it has just been renovated,” said Moretti, who is interested in the philosophy, politics, and economics multidisciplinary major in the College.
“I’m just so excited for him,” his father said. Brother Victor said he is, too, “but it’s also going to be not the same in London without him there.”
Penn Dining welcomed students to campus by allowing families and guests who pre-registered to have free lunch and dinner in five dining halls. Jacklin Xie and her family had a late lunch in the Lauder House after moving into her four-student suite in Gutmann College House. They had come from their home in Brooklyn, New York, and it was their first time on campus.
“It’s been going great. There are so many people and booths around. And everyone is really helpful and really nice,” said Xie, who is interested in studying chemistry in the College. She is planning to go to the student activities fair to learn about opportunities, perhaps the Science Olympiad.
Xie, whose parents are originally from China, said she is the first in her family to go to college. “I didn’t have a chance to go to college. My kids can go to college. We are really proud,” said her father, Jack Xie. “She can be independent. I totally believe in her.”
Taking a selfie in front of a banner at Hill College House was first-year Vardhan Agnihotri and his parents, from Irving, Texas. He is enrolled in the Jerome Fisher Program in Management and Technology, a dual-degree program between the Wharton School and Penn Engineering. “I’m looking forward to meeting new people and making new friends,” he said.
“I’m just telling him to just make memories because this is a place you can really shine and make memories and throughout your life you’ll remember these four years,” said his father, Ashutosh Agnihotri, standing with his mother, Vimukta Talwar.
Victoria Viera, the first-year student from Miami, plans to study chemistry and physics or maybe political science in the College, but she’s also interested in optical engineering, and getting involved in environmental sustainability. “I love learning about everything. Knowledge is what I like, regardless of whether it’s math, science, writing, anything,” Viera says. “And I love that Penn really does offer that diverse curriculum.”
When asked about her hopes for Victoria, her mother, Brenda Sanchez, said in Spanish: “That her dreams become reality.”
