One of the biggest worries I had when choosing where to go for school was location. My final two choices came down to a city campus, and here at Amherst. I was concerned if the remote location of Amherst would make it harder to get home even if the city college was further away. As I learned this Thanksgiving, though, that is definitely not the case. For break, the college chartered various buses to take students to different popular destinations (Logan Airport, Bradley Airport, Boston, NYC, etc.). This not only made my travel home to Boston direct and easy, but cheap, since the school covers most of the cost for the tickets. The bus was full of Amherst College students heading directly to Boston, either to go to the airport or to take the train afterwards. That was great for me, because at least I knew the guy who fell asleep on my shoulder on this bus. I heard of other students carpooling too, making spreadsheets to find drivers and passengers. This Thanksgiving experience showed me that even if our location is more remote, we do everything we can to be connected, especially in Massachusetts where the public transportation systems are already fantastic. Even if you were unable to get a spot on one of the buses or a carpool, you could easily spend less than $20 getting to Boston or Logan Airport through a combination of PVTA (Pioneer Valley Transportation Authority, our local transportation in Western MA) and MBTA (Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, the Boston/Eastern MA public transportation system). Amherst makes it easy for the herd to head home for breaks.
Herding Home for Thanksgiving at Amherst
