September 14, 2004

La Sierra University’s Freshman Orientation for 2004 took place Sept. 12-16. This is the 30th Freshman Orientation since the program was introduced to La Sierra. The middle three days of the eight day orientation program is Mountain High Retreat. About 350 [Freshmen] attended the event held at a Christian camp in the San Bernardino Mountains.

“Mountain High Retreat is good clean fun for college students where they bond as a freshman class, get to know each other, form friendships and learn about college life,” says Natan Vigna, La Sierra University assistant to vice president for student life.

“Overall the students made good friendships and connections,” says Jennifer Tyner, La Sierra University vice president for student life. “They had a good time with fellow classmates. During the interactive event we used team verbage like ‘coaches’ and ‘captains’. There were 63 current La Sierra University students who led the teams and mentored 10-12 freshmen in each team section.”

When asked what they liked about the Mountain High Retreat freshman Chihiro Oji says, “Workshops and meet a lot of people. It was great. I found out about La Sierra.”

“New friends, socializing, and being able to talk to a lot of people,” says Vincent Andel, La Sierra University freshman.

“I had a lot of fun—worship was different and I liked the change,” says Sarah Aguirre.

“I loved the camp. It was good to make new friends,” says Yishen Ma.