The moment that students stepped out of their cars after long drives from all over the country with comically miniscule leg room, they were immediately pulled into a swarm of orange shirts and leaders who energetically welcomed them to SLU. Hoping to alleviate the stress, they immediately placed all of their belongings in a big, black cart. In the blink of an eye, they were moved in. And throughout all of the activities, freshmen were filled with reassurance and joy that this was their new home—all thanks to the tireless efforts of the people in the bright orange shirts.

On Aug. 22, the Oriflamme leaders seamlessly moved in and welcomed the largest ever freshman class in SLU’s history. However, this task did not come easy. The whole event took a lot of careful planning and preparing to make the experience a success. The leaders put in hours of dancing, chanting, and learning diagrams for car traffic so everything would run as smoothly as possible. According to the leaders, all of those long hours became worth it when freshmen arrived on campus.

Nupur Chowdury, freshman, said, “they did all of the heavy lifting for me and took a lot of the stress out of how many trips we were going to have to make to our car, and I’m really grateful.” 

Not only did they do the heavy lifting, but they also planned tons of other activities to help freshmen become adjusted to SLU and learn more about what it has to offer. Spirit competitions, square dancing and tours were some ways they taught the freshmen what SLU is really about. 

“I do it for the first year students. I love being a resource to people,” said Liv Lindstrom, a senior who has been an Oriflamme leader for the past three years. The effort that the leaders put in to make them feel at home, whether it be through dance parties or group discussions, may be moments that new students take with them for the next four years.

Lindstrom said, “it was super sad knowing that this was my last time moving in the first year student class, but it also makes me excited for the new wave of oriflamme leaders to come up,”  as she reflected on the experience as “bittersweet.”

Chowdury continued, saying, “We have their numbers now so if we have any questions, we can ask, and it’s nice to have someone to look up to and depend on if we really need it.” 

All-in-all, the true success of the oriflamme leaders is that they became not only mentors to the new members of the SLU community, but also friends.