A Letter to New Students

Welcome to William and Mary.  You’re going to love it here.  You’ll hear a lot about what makes W&M unique.  Topping the list is a sense of community, a shared love of learning, outstanding and inspiring faculty and an intensity of service involvement.  I write to you tonight to explain our culture of service.

W&M service is about reaching out beyond yourself and the confines of campus to listen to, interact with and learn from others.  It’s connecting deeply with community members, near and far, and learning more from others than you ever imagined.  At W&M service is about taking risks and accepting the challenges offered by peers, faculty and community.  It’s getting so deeply immersed in an issue of concern that you cannot help but talk about it with family and friends (all the time).  In connecting so deeply and with such passion you find yourself bringing ideas back to class to debate and in some instances completely disagree with your professor (our profs are good with that).

At W&M service is contagious and represents the best kind of peer pressure around.  Imagine a place where you are peer pressured into delivering meals with Campus Kitchens Project, applying for an international service experience, advocating for alternative education at a local school board meeting or traveling to Petersburg, VA to help revitalize an entire city.

At W&M service is about transformation – of community and of self.  Welcome aboard!

See you soon.

Drew S.