OCTOBER 3, 2025 | OPINION | By Lexi Chestney
If you had told me junior year of high school that I would get into Tulane University and choose to be a Winter Start at Colorado College instead, I undoubtedly would have laughed in your face. I originally applied to CC partially because the Block Plan seemed intriguing and because I knew it would make my parents happy.
Tulane encapsulated all the aspects of college life I found desirable, and had the added bonus of my lifeline, my brother, in attendance. There was simply no way I could go to a college the size of my high school. This way of thinking did not waver until I toured CC.
The Block Plan had stood out since the moment I first learned of its functionality, and it seemed particularly pertinent to my issues of disorganization and distractibility. The emphasis on discussion as opposed to lecture captivated me above all else; I left the Springs excited about the prospect of the many ways in which I could learn.
As my senior year progressed, I grew tired of the small southern bubble I had now spent seven years of my life in, and I realized the time had come to feed the more curious parts of me. Colorado College was nothing like the schools my friends had been looking at, and I had spent much of my high school experience branding myself as nothing like the people I surrounded myself with.
I felt that by picking CC, I would be picking the part of myself I spent a significant chunk of my high school career ignoring. Despite the seemingly obvious social handicaps that I imagined would come with being a Winter Start, I took the opportunity at hand.
The first downside to being a Winter Start, one that is slightly more obvious than others, is that it is pretty damn cold. My first day of class was -4 degrees Fahrenheit. As a native Texan, it had pretty much never occurred to me that anyone would choose to step outside when it’s hit a subzero temperature.
But past just physical discomfort, I think it is vastly underestimated what the cold does to one’s capacity for socialization. The difference in the overall energy of my peers this semester compared to the last is jarring.
It feels like I did not even show up to the same college; the air is filled with laughter, people are everywhere on campus and everyone is more inclined to branch out. Back in January, the chilly climate was reflected in many of the interactions I had.
People were aloof or worse, entirely disinterested in getting to know me. Everyone seemed to be in low spirits, grappling with the drama of a semester I was not even in attendance for.
The experience of being a Winter Start during orientation week itself is also worth noting. We did not receive the schedule until the day we arrived. Prior to that, my mom and I had been guessing at the week ahead using the dates available from NSO. I had five fellow White-tailed Pharmagans, and somehow three Priddy leaders, an almost even ratio.
How could this be? It turns out there were supposed to be 50 Winter Starts, but somehow there ended up being 20. While I understand why there is less incentive for planning and worry surrounding less than two dozen new arrivals, I could not help but feel a little neglected. Being a Winter Start already felt like having half your foot out the door of being a part of the class of ‘28, but to feel as though the school itself was not fully tending to you from the get-go set the precedent for how the next few months would transpire.
The Block Plan, while innovative for the sake of learning, is not exactly conducive to making friends in college when you come halfway through freshman year. I spent my first two blocks in FYPs with exactly six people. The same six people.
In hindsight, I appreciate this experience immensely. It takes a certain kind of person to be a Winter Start, and getting to be in discussion with those people was fascinating, creating an almost familial experience. But admitting students in a way that will inevitably have strong social consequences that negatively impact their experience, and then taking no initiative to accommodate their experience was frustrating to me and my fellow Winter Starts.
I had heard of some fall starts having their First-Year Programs first and third block—why not make that the norm for anyone admitted as a Winter Start, making their FYPs during fifth and seventh block? That way, we could have a chance to meet some new people in a setting that didn’t feel forced. I would feel differently about this if I attended a large state school, but I had always perceived personal connection and accommodations as the upsides that come with attending a smaller institution.
If I had applied to The University of Texas—as many from my high school did—and they had admitted me the way this school did, I would not have given it a second thought. It would be too debilitating to my experience, too impersonal. At Colorado College, I did not have to just be a cog or a statistic.
After the excitement they built up around what it means to be a Winter Start during NSO week, I expected more from my first semester experience, but everyone just seemed to hop right back into the swing of things that none of us newbies were familiar with.
Past my bitter ragging on the school itself, the social aspects I knew would inevitably be hard ended up being enormously harder than expected. To be point-blank, I have never in my life struggled socially. My mom used to tell me I could make friends with a paper bag. I was well aware that I would have to put extensive effort into making friends, given that everyone would have likely found their people by the time I arrived.
Still, for much of my time abroad, I remained hopeful about my spring semester: “Even if it takes time, people will see me for who I am.” I thank God for this unearned sense of confidence I have always had. I think it is the only reason I made it through the first few blocks without putting in a transfer application.
Here is where I have to take a step back and be a little self-aware. Part of what plagued my Winter Start experience was my expectations. I went to a preppy, unkind high school. But that was the bit, overt and unapologetic. I knew what I signed up for and what I was navigating.
But when I chose this school, I put it on somewhat of a pedestal. Intellectual, progressive, elite, but not name-brand enough to attract the status succulents. I was ecstatic to escape the conventionality of my hometown, and this college was the holy grail of everything I stood for. So it was much to my surprise when I was met with about a quarter of the friendliness I had expected from a student body branded as abnormally kind and accepting.
It was once brilliantly stated by several, including Martin Luther King Jr., that “character is how you treat those who can do nothing for you.” I think being a Winter Start showed me the truth of this sentiment to an uncomfortable extent. People had just spent all of last semester trying to be likable, make friends, establish solid reputations or make a good first impression.
Now that January had rolled around, not everyone had it in them to keep up the act. I was just some random girl trying to talk to them, and it didn’t matter much if they acted invested or not, because I didn’t know enough people for my opinions on them to matter.
There are many people who are kind to me now who weren’t at the beginning. Whether it was as undisguised an act of judgment as looking me up and down as I walked by or as passive as looking past me for someone more interesting to talk to as I introduced myself, I felt tarnished by my status as a novice. I do not hold these things against people, nor did I in high school.
People change, and my bitterness does not serve me. But it did ruin the illusory perception I had created in my head as to what the student body at Colorado College would look like and how distinct it would be from home. Women in Blundstones and Carhartts can be just as cruel as girls in Golden Gooses.
With all that being said, it would be downright offensive for me not to acknowledge the people who saved me from drowning under the label of “Winter Start.” I can now say in full confidence that I have made the friendships at this school that I came here looking for. I can name quite a few people who sincerely went out of their way to be kind to me––my friend group of two weeks brought me flowers upon hearing I reinjured my knee. Some girls would come up to me to tell me they recognized me from Instagram, and some would initiate a hangout to learn more about my experience so far.
There are lots of people at this school who embody the characteristics it brands itself to adhere to. Never in my life have I had the privilege of being around friends who I feel get me the way people here do, and never have I gotten to be consistently surrounded by such deeply thoughtful, clever and altruistic human beings.
While there were far more hindrances than anticipated, I have ultimately gotten what I came here for. In this way, is it worth it to be a Winter Start? If you stomach some academic and social downsides and put in the work when you get here, you can achieve what others did with a little more ease in the fall. Is that possibility not amazing in itself, despite its limitations? I believe that if you want something badly enough, an opportunity being afforded to you is a special thing, and I know how much of a privileged life I’ve led to get to be somewhere as unique as CC.
But no matter what, I will always feel like a Winter Start. It feels as though every impression I have of people is defined by my awkward jumping-off point. I find I still introduce myself as a Winter Start, despite this not really holding any prevalence now that I am a sophomore.
Something about the jolt of having a week catered so personally to you and just a handful of other people, and then feeling pretty much forgotten about from that point on, just tainted the experience entirely.
By missing the first chapter, it sometimes seems I jumped in on page 50 of my college experience without reading the prologue. So while I appreciate the opportunity and value the experience I have had, I can understand why there are no Winter Starts for the Class of 2029.