Written by James Elinski, Film Production Major with an LGBT Studies Cluster
I am Jimmy Elinski and I’m a transfer student who transferred into the Film Production Program in Fall 2018. My transfer story began a year and a half before I ever arrived at Chapman as a student. It was the end of my freshman year at my former university. I didn’t feel like home there and I knew I wanted to transfer to a school on the west coast. With my parents’ permission, I began to research schools to transfer to. Chapman was the only school that interested me. I never visited it, I didn’t know anyone who went there, I just had a feeling that Chapman was the place I was meant to be.
The summer leading into my sophomore year at my old university, my mother and I decided to take a trip to California. I grew up in a very small rural town in Pennsylvania and I had never even been to California, but I knew that’s where I wanted to be. So, my mom and I flew to Orange and I visited campus for the first time. Immediately, I fell in love. We walked around and toured the campus and I was mesmerized by Dodge College and everything it offered. I knew I needed to be here. While we were visiting, we scheduled a meeting with an academic advisor to discuss what we needed to do for me to transfer into the film program. We were informed that only 1% of transfer students get accepted into the film program. I was devastated when I heard this news. How am I ever going to get to my dream school if the acceptance rate of transfers is only 1%?
After hearing that news, I remember aimlessly walking through the library because I knew if I was never going to be here again, I wanted to at least walk around the library (I’m obsessed with libraries). I went back to Pennsylvania, determined to get into Chapman. Then ten months later, I found out that I was accepted into the film program as a transfer!
The weeks leading up to Orientation Week, I grew more and more anxious. I was worried about making friends. I was worried that I had made the wrong decision. Along with pride and excitement, I was scared. I felt like a freshman all over again. My parents and I moved all my stuff into my dorm room and I met my roommate, a very typical college experience; meeting a stranger that you’re going to share a living area with for a year.
The first day of Transfer Orientation began and my Transfer Orientation Leaders had us all take polaroid photos of ourselves and write what we were worried about on them. I wrote, “blending into the background and not making many friends.” It sounds kind of depressing, but trust me, there was nothing I had to worry about. On the first day, I met so many great people who I became extremely close with. My Orientation Leaders were so helpful at facilitating a sense of community within the Transfer group. I met all four of my roommates who I live with now on the first day of Orientation. I even celebrated my twenty-first birthday on the Friday of Orientation Week. At first, I was concerned that I wouldn’t be surrounded by anyone I knew but by Friday, I became pretty close with a handful of other transfers.
Within the first week of school, I knew that I had made the right decision. By September, I had begun working as a student assistant for the campus library and joined Delta Kappa Alpha, a gender-inclusive professional cinematic fraternity. My first semester at Chapman was everything I had hoped it would be. I made so many new friends and more importantly, I found my home. Transferring into Chapman was the best decision I ever made. My initial fears had all disappeared once I found my rhythm at the university.
Going into my senior year at my dream university, I can look back and say that I had nothing to worry about. I allowed myself to experience everything Chapman offered to me and I am so thankful that I did because I can look back and thank Chapman for accepting me and allowing me to find a true home. As an Orientation Leader for the upcoming fall, I hope that I can help students experience the same things I had experienced. I’m excited to help bring in a new group of students to our university!
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