Most freshmen spend the first day of school moving in and getting settled. But this year, 15 Elon students spent their first day of college in the remote wilderness of Wyoming with Elon's gap semester program. Now, the gap semester students are arriving on campus for the first time after their semester-long adventure, and students like Lizzie Thomson and Michaela Contois are looking back on how much they've bonded as a group.

"I think throwing anybody into the wilderness, you don't have a choice other than to become like family," Thomson said.

The gap semester program takes Elon students from the National Outdoor Leadership School in Wyoming, across the country to Washington, D.C. with several stops along the way and finally on a study abroad trip to Costa Rica. Now, Thomson and Contois are trying to adapt to the differences between experiential and classroom learning.

"Like in Costa Rica, we learned about a place and then we would drive there on the weekend, go there and chill on the beach there and be able to understand it and learn the culture actually in the place," Thomson said, "So it's very different."

Thomson and Contois met when they took part in the second year of the program this fall. They became friends when Thomson knocked Contois's teeth out while their hiking group was scaling a mountain in Wyoming. Despite the ordeal, the two have become friends and are now rooming together on campus.

"We have it a little bit easier cause we are rooming together so we're both going through it together," Contois said of adapting to campus life.

As they adapt, Thomson and Contois are unpacking their experiences and are excited to share them with those on campus.

"We've seen a lot of cultural issues and social issues just facing Americans and other citizens we were unaware of," Thomson said. "And it's just been very eye-opening. It's just been very moving in one way or another to share the voices of the people that we've heard."

This program may be expanding in the coming years to include either more first-semester first-year students or non first-semester first-year students, according to Steve Morrison, coordinator of gap programs.

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