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Campus Rules and Regulations

Another adjustment individuals will face is that international campus rules and regulations in some cases are more conservative than those in North American colleges. Because there are secondary students on some campuses, some of the rules and regulations are established to positively guide younger persons in terms of their religious development and establishing good study habits and orderliness. Depending on the campus, students may well expect that there will be a requirement of more formal religious service attendance, and, in some Schools, earlier evening returns to residence halls. Depending on the campus, people who oversleep may have the surprise of being awakened by a monitor who personally comes to each room to encourage class or Sabbath service attendance. Residence hall rooms may be inspected to insure that they are clean, neat, and orderly. These encouragements are not meant to "demean" people and make them feel "less mature" or "like they're children." ACA students who take an adult attitude toward these different practices and avoid seeing them as a loss of their adulthood or privacy will actually find that these "required activities" can help them grow spiritually and linguistically if they approach them positively.

Some regulations may be very frustrating, but are not meant to be. In fact, more required worship services on a daily basis have been designed to meet European and Latin American students' expectations that Seventh-day Adventist students have chosen Seventh-day Adventist schools so they can actively participate in the religious life of the campus (including Sabbath School, church services and Sabbath afternoon activities, excursions and services). Sunday is the day for pleasure and inactivity.

At some international campuses, some restrictions--for example, the hours that one must return to the residence halls at night--are not what North American college students have experienced recently. However, the European college students do not seem to chafe under these rules.

If things are different, accept them for the way they are. They are not right or wrong because they are different unless there is actually a moral conflict involved. Students who try to be themselves, and to be as open and flexible as possible and not take everything as a personal affront, will be able to profit most from their time abroad.

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