Issue date: 8/22/01 Section: Aggie Life

Nicholas Anthis’ first glimpse of life at Texas A&M was through aqua-colored Fish Camp glasses.

A freshman biochemistry and genetics major, Anthis pulled up to the Olsen Field parking lot for Session A of Fish Camp 2001. He found himself amid costumes, yelling and whistle-blowing camp counselors. As part of the first session’s aqua camp, Anthis was taught to be bleed maroon — with an aqua-blue tinge, his camp color.

After driving the two hours to Fish Camp’s traditional site at Lakeview, near Palestine, for the rest of the four-day camp, the freshmen “just kind of yelled a lot,” Anthis said.

“I would have to tell anyone who’s going to Fish Camp that you’re going to have a blast,” Anthis said. “The most important point for me was meeting people. But you get to know A&M, and you get a chance to adjust to college life before you get there.”

Fish Camp was first created in 1954 to introduce new A&M students to campus traditions and to aid in the transition from high school to college. Almost 4,300 students — or about two-thirds of the freshman class — registered to attend this year, said Seth Sullivan, assistant Fish Camp director and a senior industrial distribution major.

The camp program is split into six different sessions differentiated by color, each lasting four days. The first sessions begin in early August and end just before Fall 2001 classes begin. These camps are named in honor of University and community leaders. This year, camps were named after former President George Bush and Tim and Janice Kerlee parents of, Tim Kerlee Jr., who died after the 1999 Texas Aggie Bonfire collapse.

The main focus of each camp is to talk, Sullivan said. Ten to 12 freshmen meet with two counselors in individual discussion groups, which serve as the springboard for conversations about college life, from worries and fears to handling classes and dating, Sullivan said.

“This is our main avenue to make freshmen feel comfortable about coming to A&M,” Sullivan said. “If we can make the fish laugh and break down barriers, then we’ve done our jobs.”

The six different camps come together at night to watch camp counselors perform skits and demonstrate such Aggie traditions as the yells and the War Hymn. About 900 upperclassmen serve as counselors. The freshmen also participate in a mock Silver Taps and a Midnight Yell.

Not much differs from year to year in Fish Camp, said Sullivan, who’s been a part of the camp since he first attended as a freshman. He sees Fish Camp as an A&M tradition that helps to carry on the other traditions of the school.

“It’s good to know that it won’t change,” Sullivan said. “Traditions are what drew me to the school, and Fish Camp is ensuring that new students get the same welcoming feel and carry on the same traditions that we did before them. We are teaching the Class of 2005 the same things I was taught.”

Freshman Hershel Patel, a biomedical engineering major from Plano, will leave at 9 a.m. today in the final session of Fish Camp.

“I expect that I’ll learn about A&M,” Patel said. “I came to this school because it’s a good engineering school, but I want to (find out) what else it is.”

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