Hartwick College began its annual three-day Wick Weekend Friday, Aug. 28, welcoming new and transfer students who moved into dorms and attended convocation.
Returning students are scheduled to arrive Sunday. Classes begin Monday.
It also marked the start of the first academic year for President Laurel Bongiorno, who assumed office June 1. The college’s board of trustees appointed her after serving as vice president for academic affairs and provost.
“Switching into the president role is so much fun,” she said, adding that in the morning she gave out Hartwick College branded socks to “a lot of happy faces.”
The private liberal arts college welcomed first-year students from 21 states and from countries including Vietnam and the Dominican Republic, according to the school’s communications office.
About half were recruited to play for an athletic team, and 85% came from New York state. About 40% were eligible for the school’s HartLand Promise scholarship program for students from the region, and 28% were the first in their family to attend college.
The school did not provide a number for total students in the class of 2030.
Two of those students, Jasmine Suarez and Laney Avezzano, were looking for Frisbee Field Friday afternoon. Students gathered there before walking up to Elmore Field, where they took their class picture. They then entered Lambros Arena for the convocation ceremony.
Suarez, from Hawthorne in Westchester County, said she was looking forward to “being more independent.”
“I’m an inclusive education major, so I would work with both regular and special ed kids during my time in the program,” she said. She added that “a lot of the other schools I was looking into, they didn’t have the inclusive part that I wanted, so that was definitely a big reason I came here.”
The view, she said while walking down steps overlooking Oneonta, was a part of the school’s appeal, too.
Avezzano, from Albany, is a psychology major who was excited to see “different classes and different pathways I can go with it.” She said she was looking forward to “meeting new people” and “making lasting friendships.”
Her initial visit to the “beautiful” campus was “just one of the most welcoming visits I ever had,” she said, adding that she felt comfortable immediately.
Bongiorno, whose inauguration ceremony is scheduled for Sept. 25, said “we have positioned ourselves as the ‘life balance college,’ and that really is who we are.”
“We try to think of ourselves as a place where students are getting a holistic education,” she said, adding that “we’re trying not to stress them out” and that the school offers opportunities like glass blowing, music, hiking and other activities to balance with more traditional academics.
Bongiorno becomes president at a difficult moment for many small colleges across the country. According to an analysis of 2024 data by the Huron Consulting Group, 442 colleges in the United States “could face financial exigency within the next decade.”
Those numbers are paired with a steep decline in the number of 18-year-olds nationwide, a so-called ‘demographic cliff’ as reported by NPR, the Hechinger Report and other outlets.
Bongiorno said “we have a plan.”
“We did a tuition reset a few years ago, which positions us very nicely with our SUNY colleagues across the state,” she said, adding that the school talks about “the private college opportunity with the price of the public, so that’s really important to us.”
The Hartwick College website advertises tuition of $23,500 for 2026-27, with annual scholarships of up to $10,000.
Bongiorno said travel offerings “are almost fully funded for students because of philanthropy, and we have created new majors like sports management, really popular. So we’re trying to stay really relevant for students.”
Other Wick Weekend activities for students include meeting faculty, games of bingo, a safety and wellbeing information session and a scavenger hunt to orient students to the campus and each other.
On Sunday evening, new first-year and transfer students will participate in First Walk, a walk along Founders’ Way through the heart of campus which students then repeat in four years upon graduation as Last Walk, bookending their time at Hartwick.