Our campus of 8,600+ acres gives students space to roam—both physically and intellectually. But it isn’t just the setting that makes Duke unlike any other university. It’s the feeling—the kinetic energy of connections forged, creativity sparked, and ideas born. It’s an electricity that inspires passion and action.
The first year at Duke is an exciting and sometimes overwhelming time, with hundreds of clubs to join, intellectual debates to begin, and 1,700 new people to meet. But you won’t be doing it alone. You’ll have classmates, professors, and advisors who are committed to helping you navigate the transition, from the moment you step on campus to begin your Duke journey.
Daily Campus Visits
All first-year students live on East Campus. A five-minute bus ride from West Campus, East Campus includes 172 acres of open lawns, residence halls, research labs, tennis courts, a dining hall, café, convenience store, library, theater, and gym. It’s also a short walk to Durham’s Ninth Street District, where you can visit Whole Foods, grab a bagel or Peruvian chicken, and visit the Regulator Bookshop. Head in the other direction and you’ll hit downtown and its award-winning restaurants, historical sites, and tech start-ups.
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Follow the lives of two first-year students for a window into a typical day at Duke.
Shrey Majmudar Trinity College of Arts & Sciences 
Ramya Ginjupalli Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
Before coming to Duke, I knew that my first class of the day couldn’t be before 10 a.m. Sure enough, that’s how I’ve created my schedule, and it’s never been an issue! That said, I try to get out of the dorm by 9:20 a.m. to head to Marketplace for a made-to-order omelet, hash browns, yogurt with granola and fruit, a pastry or two, and some apple juice. Then I grab a seat and listen to “The Daily” podcast by The New York Times.
I just wrapped my 10:05 a.m. Italian class. After class, I hang around to chat with my professor, Dr. Stefano Maranzana, and set up a time to grab lunch through Duke’s FLUNCH program, where each student gets $70 to eat lunch with a faculty member every semester. On my way out, I run into two friends and we decide to get lunch. One is a first-year whom I met randomly at Marketplace, and the other is a first-year whom I met through Scale & Coin—Duke’s Business Society and also a great friend group!
I’m in a project room in the Edge, a modern study space with whiteboards for walls, on West Campus, meeting with three other students to plan for a club we’ve just started, called FIRST. FIRST helps mentor local elementary, middle, and high school kids who participate in FIRST Robotics. In the meeting, we plan to create a Slack Team for our 70+ members and start planning our trip to take students to the FIRST Robotics World Championships in Houston, Texas.
I’m walking out of Public Policy 302: Policy Choice as Values Conflict with a few upperclassmen. Though it’s a 30-person class, there are only three first-years. We’re talking about the incredible presentation a group of students just gave on the current cyber warfare policies in the U.S. compared to other world powers, and the ethics of whether the U.S. should adopt an offensive cyber warfare strategy or remain defensive. It’s a fascinating topic that has made for some intense classroom debates and discussions.
I head to Schiciano Auditorium with some of my friends (including Ramya) for our weekly Duke Student Government meeting. DSG has helped me find another amazing group of friends—a true family. Today, the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education, Dr. Gary Bennett, is the guest speaker. I leave feeling quite optimistic about Duke’s future.
I start the day in my MATH 111L class, which is the equivalent of Calculus I, sitting next to my four best friends, who are also my lab partners for the laboratory portion of this course. The class is discussing derivatives and their application to minimize the production cost of cars, given tariffs on imported auto parts. I have no interest in pursuing auto manufacturing, but it’s really exciting to see a real-world application of a topic discussed so heavily in class.
I head to Marketplace to eat lunch with friends from my Medical Ethics class. We sit around discussing the implications of PAS (Physician-Assisted Suicide) in Oregon while I munch on a made-to-order chicken sandwich from the 1892 Grille.
My favorite study spot is in Bostock Library, where I’m studying for my upcoming exam in Inorganic Chemistry. I purposefully placed breaks in my class schedule, since I enjoy studying during the day. I go to “Vondy” (short for Von der Heyden Pavilion), a popular coffee shop in the library, to grab a caramel macchiato and pumpkin bread and then head to my favorite study spot. I love grabbing a reservable study room in the back of the Edge with my friends so that we can write notes on the whiteboards.
I decide to grab dinner at the Brodhead Center, since it’s close to Bostock Library. I grab an arepa bowl from Sazon, the Latin-American restaurant, and sit down with some of my upperclassmen friends at a table outside. Some of my other favorite foods include quesadillas from Krafthouse, a mango smoothie from Au Bon Pain, and a banana foster crêpe from the CaFe. There are so many amazing food options on West Campus.
After my Duke Student Government meeting with Shrey, I head back to East Campus to the Bell Tower fourth floor common room to hang out with some friends. We are taking BuzzFeed quizzes to decide what Hogwarts House we are in and playing endless games of Paranoia. My day typically ends like this—hanging with friends until one in the morning laughing about absolutely anything and everything.
Durham is one of the nation’s best cities in which to eat, play, and live. As part of North Carolina’s Research Triangle, Durham boasts one of the largest concentrations of PhDs and MDs in the world, and is home to hundreds of global companies, including IBM, GSK, Syngenta, RTI International, Credit Suisse, and Biogen. With a thriving high-tech community, a flourishing art scene, and a food culture rivaling major metropolitan areas, Durham is a great place to call home.
