Picture it: The sun is shining, the air is clear and crisp, and there you are on campus, sitting under a gently reddening maple tree. You've got a couple of textbooks next to you, a travel mug of java in your hand, and you're ready to do a little reading.

Ahh, the life of a college freshman. Isn't it grand?

Well, yeah, but it rarely looks like that. OK, maybe the trees are pretty, and maybe you can manage to find a few hours to relax in the fall sun. But real life on campus isn't always like the pictures you see in the view books.

Most of the time it's even better.

So what can you expect your first year at college to be like? To find out, we asked freshmen at four Christian colleges to let us peek at a typical day on campus. Their experiences prove one thing: College life might not be all colorful leaves and sunshine, but it's definitely a blast!

Tuesday, 9:00 a.m.
Since Amy's first commitment today is chapel at 9:30, she gets to sleep in a little. That doesn't leave much time for getting ready, but Amy has planned ahead. "I shower at night so I can sleep later. And I don't usually get up for breakfast. I'd rather sleep than eat."

9:30
Amy attends chapel with some girls from her hall. Despite her love of sleep, Amy says she wouldn't want to miss chapel. "I love the singing, and they usually have really interesting speakers."

10:30
Time for psych class. With only 25 people in the class, Amy finds it easy to get involved in the discussions and pay attention.

11:50
Amy's ready for lunch with some friends at "The Grill," a campus hangout where she can eat as part of her meal plan. Amy and her buds talk about a little of everything—the upcoming soccer game, classes, life in general.

1:00 p.m.
Before her next class, Amy's got a few minutes to go back to her dorm and trade her psych books for her New Testament class books. Back in her room, she takes a second to call a friend she hasn't seen for several days.

1:30
Amy struggles to stay awake during her long New Testament class. Amy says, "Sometimes people start debating something that really doesn't interest me. Like today some people starting talking about smuggling Bibles into China. That's not something that interests me right now, so my mind kind of drifted. Plus, this class is right after lunch, so it's already hard to stay awake."

3:30
After class, Amy dumps her books back at her dorm, then walks over to the soccer field to watch some friends play in an intramural game.

5:30
Back to "The Grill" for dinner with her friend Christy from the dorm.

6:00
Amy heads back to her dorm to do some reading, then walks to the gym for a friend's volleyball game. Some girls from her hall are there, so Amy joins them to watch the game and talk for a couple of hours.

9:00
Amy's schedule really kicks into high gear now. First, she has a Student Activity Board meeting. The SAB is made up of representatives from each hall, and Amy volunteered for her hall. The SAB plans all kinds of on-campus events, like the Welcome Weekend for freshmen.

10:00
Amy meets with Grace Ministries in Action. This group sends Grace students to inner-city neighborhoods one weekend a month to put on Bible clubs for kids. Amy's team was assigned to Indianapolis. Tonight, she and her team review their last trip to Indy and get their assignments for next time.

11:00
Taco Time! It's midterm week at Grace, so the SAB is sponsoring a Taco Bell run/study break. A couple hundred Grace students, including Amy, descend on a local Taco Bell for all the free tacos they can eat. Amy says, "The line was around the block. Taco Bell said we ate 1,100 tacos. I only had three, but one guy I talked to ate 15!"

12:30 a.m.
Amy gets started on her debate homework. She also gets some math done before getting ready for bed.

3:00
Bedtime, at long last.

Tuesday, 9:00 a.m.
Because Joe doesn't have a class until 11 on Tuesday and Thursdays, he usually stays up late the night before, studying. Although he often rises as early as 6 a.m., Joe sacks out until mid-morning today.

9:30
Joe misses breakfast at the dining hall because of his late start (the cafeteria closes at 9). Still in need of sustenance, he heads for the dorm community kitchen to exercise his cooking skills. While his blueberry muffins bake, Joe reviews flash-cards for his test in Biblical Interpretation class on Wednesday. After eating, he piles the leftover muffins in a coffee can so he can pass them out to friends throughout the day.

10:30
Joe moves into a comfortable chair in the dorm lobby and reads a few pages of a book for his Life of Christ class, held every Wednesday night at 6:30. As he prepares to leave, Joe lingers in the lobby talking to friends from his choir ensemble. They discuss a trip they're taking to Oregon this upcoming weekend, then break into a spontaneous rendition of a song Joe's roommate has written.

11:00
All of Joe's ensemble friends are in the same class at 11—Basic Christian Theology. Every student at San Jose must get a Bible major, as well as another degree. So most of Joe's classes this semester center around the Bible.

12:00 p.m.
After class, Joe meets two good friends, Nicole and Eric, for lunch. Nicole and Eric are the vice-president and president of the student body. Since Joe was elected the freshman class representative, the three have lots in common.

12:45
Back to the dorm to study.

1:30
Joe takes his place on a riser for ensemble practice, held Tuesday and Thursday. The ensemble includes about 25 people.

2:30
Since he's got two midterms on Wednesday, Joe's a study-holic today. He locks himself in his room after ensemble and buries his head in the books until 6.

6:00
Figuring he'd waste too much time at the school cafeteria, Joe fixes a quick dinner in the dorm kitchen. "I eat a lot of Ramen noodles," he confesses. Joe eats and gets ready to help out with his church's high school youth group, which meets at 7.

7:00
An unexpected change of plans. Every Tuesday night, the resident assitant on Joe's floor does room checks between 8 and 9. Joe and his two roommates, Pat and Eric, are expected to keep the place vacuumed and neat. Tonight, Joe has youth group and Eric has to work at campus security, and the room is a dump. Pat feels like a lone ranger, so an argument erupts. Soon, the guys are in an all-out shouting match about who's gonna clean up the mess. Unavoidably, Joe misses youth group.

7:45
The conflict comes to a peaceful conclusion. The guys all agree that the room should be straightened up on a regular basis, not just once a week. With the time he would have spent at church, Joe gets some extra studying done.

10:00
Although it hasn't been a very long day, Joe's exhausted. He decides he can study for his two tests in the morning, so he's free to hit the hay.

Thursday, 7:00 a.m.
The alarm rings. Some college students get to sleep in. Not Gina. She went to bed after midnight the night before, so 7 a.m. could hardly be considered "sleeping in." She is, however, pretty much the only person awake on her floor. Bonus: She has the bathroom to herself.

7:05
After brushing her teeth, she's off for a two-mile run.

7:30
Back from her run, Gina hits the still-empty showers and gets ready for her 8:00 class. Breakfast is a cafeteria bagel eaten on the way to class.

8:00
Review time in American History class. "I was tired and I didn't really want to go, but we have a test next week and I needed to go over my notes."

9:30
Gina heads to the Student Center to meet with the Dean of Students, who also happens to be her advisor. They talk over her schedule and make sure everything's going well. Gina says, "This was our first meeting, and I really liked talking to him. Since he's the Dean, he knows how things work around here and can help me out a lot."

10:00
Back to the dorm room for some study time. Gina's roommate is a basketball player and is usually at the gym working out or practicing, so Gina often has the room to herself. And what is she studying for? "This sounds so dumb, but I had to study for my football test." Her what? "I'm taking a Fall Sports class, and we had to learn all these terms I'd never heard of, so I really needed to study before the test at 11."

11:00
The football test! Once she finishes her test, Gina heads back to her dorm to drop off her books before lunch. So how'd the test go? "I knew all the terms, so I think I did fine." And now she can impress all her friends with her extensive knowledge of the lateral pass.

12:00 p.m.
A nice, leisurely lunch in the cafeteria with her brother, a sophomore at ETBU, and other friends. The conversation ranges from classes and papers that are due, to Christianity, to guys. Gina says, "It's been easy to get to know people. There's such a big variety of people at college, and I'm making some great Christian friends."

12:45
Gina runs back to her dorm to grab her books, then heads over to the history department to meet with her American History prof, who'd offered to answer questions about the upcoming test. Gina and two other students are taking him up on his offer and getting a little more help for the big exam.

1:30
Gina pops back to the Student Center to deliver a birthday gift to her friend Emily, who's working at the Center.

1:45
As if Gina needed one more thing to do today, it's also yearbook picture time! Students just drop in whenever they can and get their picture taken, so Gina takes a second to smile for the camera.

2:00
Off to choir. The choir has a concert tonight, so the time is spent rehearsing for their performance.

3:30
Time to hit the most important book. Gina joins the rest of the Baptist Student Ministry group. Right now, they're working on apologetics and learning how to really dig in to God's Word for answers to tough questions.

4:00
Normally, Gina's Thursday afternoons involve Kids Club, a campus ministry. Kids Club members like Gina usually meet with low-income kids on Tuesdays and Thursdays to play with them and help them with schoolwork. But Gina isn't able to go today. Instead, she heads back to the dorm to get ready for her choir concert.

5:15
Gina heads over to the music building. There, she boards the bus that will take the choir to a concert in a town about 30 minutes away. Most of the choir members talk or goof around on the bus, but for Gina, the bus ride is a chance to study for tomorrow's test in speech class. "I wasn't expecting to study this much at college," says Gina. "But my first couple of tests showed me I have to study to do well."

6:00
The choir warms up, sets up, and puts on a great concert.

9:30
Time to head back to campus. By now, it's too dark to read, so Gina takes a much-needed break and talks with her friends on the bus.

10:30
Gina joins her floormates for the hall meeting. Her Resident Advisor calls these meetings once in a while to update the girls on new info, plan future social events and check in with everybody. Hall meetings can be fun, but tonight, Gina tells her R.A. she's got to leave early to study for her speech test. The concert cut into valuable study time, and Gina's feeling the pressure to get some serious homework done.

10:45
Back in her room, Gina studies for her test, says good night to her roommie, then does some work on an English paper that's due soon.

1:30 a.m.
Finally, it's time to sleep. After a long, busy day, Gina is wiped out. She may be tired, but Gina says, "I'm having the time of my life!"

Wednesday, 9:00 a.m.
Josh, who considers himself lucky not to have an 8 o'clock class, gets up, takes a shower, dresses and grabs the books he needs for his first three classes. Then he heads for the dining hall. "Breakfast is probably the best meal at our cafeteria," he says. "I wouldn't want to miss it."

9:30
Often, Josh goes to meals alone, but he usually finds someone there to eat with. "You make a lot of friends that way," he says. After breakfast, Josh sees his friend Dan. They chat briefly about their recent midterm break, then Josh rushes off to class.

10:00
Josh sits through an all-freshman class called CCXP (Contemporary College Experience). It's a topical discussion that covers memory skills, note-taking and test-taking. Rumored to be an easy A, Josh is only pulling a B. He got the hard teacher, he says.

11:00
French 101 convenes.

12:00 p.m.
Josh completes his string of classes with Music Survey. A computer science major, he's also a part of the honors program at GWU. Throughout their college careers, honors students must maintain a 3.0 average, take 15 hours of honors classes, write and present a senior thesis, and do community service. The program is by invitation only, so Josh is happy to be involved.

12:50
After class, Josh walks to the cafeteria for a much-needed lunch. Since the school post office is in the same building, Josh checks his mailbox for signs of life ... and gets a letter from friends back home!

1:30
It's been a back-breaking morning, so Josh drops by his room and dumps all of his books off from his last three classes. Then he quickly checks his e-mail, since his roommate has a computer and Internet access. After reading his messages and getting a head start on a class assignment, it's off to class again.

2:00
Western Civilization is a longer, lecture-style class. According to Josh it's also incredibly boring. Almost all of the 40 students bombed the first test (Josh passed—barely). It only meets Monday and Wednesday, so on Fridays Josh likes to play tennis. He's already won one intramural tennis tournament at Gardner-Webb.

3:15
Josh walks out of class with his friend Carrie, who tells him about the car troubles she had during the weekend. Carrie leaves to take a nap and Josh is off to meet another friend. Since Josh has arranged to meet his friend Leslie at 3:15, he goes to her dorm and calls her from the lobby.

3:30
Leslie and Josh sit on a brick wall outside her dorm and talk about life. They're just friends, for all of you who might be curious. "She doesn't want a boyfriend right now," Josh admits. At around 5, Leslie leaves to grab some dinner and Josh heads back to his dorm.

5:00
Never one to waste time, Josh studies a little before dinner. He has three tests coming up, and he really wants to be prepared.

6:00
Back to the cafeteria. Josh hangs there with friends until about 6:45—the latest he feels he can stay and still finish all the work he needs to do.

6:45
Study time. Josh doesn't cram for exams. He likes to work ahead and study a little each night. "Hey, my philosophy is that if I end up going out with a girl, I can put off the homework till later, since I've already done some of it."

8:00
Time for a TV study break. Although Josh doesn't own a TV, his roommate does, and he lets Josh use it.

9:00
More studying. That's the life!

10:00
Josh finally closes the books for the night. Instead of going straight to bed, he rewards himself by playing a few computer games.

11:00
Sweet dreams.

Copyright (c) 1999 by the author or Christianity Today, Inc./Campus Life magazine. For reprint information call 630-260-6200 or e-mail CLMag@campuslife.net.