The campus of Olivet is bustling with activity as faculty and staff welcomed new and returning students for the 2024-2025 academic year. In preparation for the start of the school year, the Offices of Student Development and Student Life created a schedule of events providing opportunity for students to engage with one another in fellowship and fun.
Move-In Weekend and Jump Start
During move-in weekend, faculty, staff and student leaders from across campus groups helped to celebrate our incoming class of students – our largest group in school history – as they began their Olivet experience. This remarkable group is already enhancing the vibrancy of campus life and culture.
The annual Jump Start conference, which includes guest speakers, worship services, and social activities, allowed the freshman and transfer students to build connections with their peers.
Soon after the other three classes of returning students made their way to campus to begin the academic year.
First Day of Classes and Chapel
On Wednesday, August 28, students attended their first classes as well as the first chapel of the semester. With the whole campus gathered for a time of worship, University Chaplain, Tone Marshall ’13, revealed the theme for the coming semester: Blessed.
In his message, Tone relayed the definition of blessed as “more than a temporary or circumstantial illusion of happiness. It is a state of well-being in right relationship to God that provides true happiness.”
During Thursday’s chapel service Dr. Gregg Chenoweth discussed the topic of being happy in hardships, sharing, in a moment of vulnerability, testimonies of God’s faithfulness through tragedies from his own life.
“If God had not permitted me that hardship, I wouldn’t be preaching to you today,” Dr. Chenoweth stated. “A loving God permits hardship, pruning from us what is not fruitful. He promises to draw near to the broken hearted.”
Ollies Follies
Olivet’s annual Ollies Follies events, the highly anticipated tradition, 
began with exciting athletic games following the first day of classes. The energy carried into wacky games later in the week, when students competed in favorite out-of-the-box relay games. The competition finished a week later with the variety show. Each class put together a show that combined video and live performance elements pertaining to the theme “Landmarks.” After an entertaining final night of competition, the sophomore class was declared the winner.
The semester still holds several more exciting events for the Olivet community. For more information about upcoming events on campus, visit olivet.edu/events.
