General Program Information
Walking to orientation sessions & weather
The Graduate Hotel is about a 10-15 minute walk to the VCU campus and Gateway Orientation sessions. You will be walking to all orientation events/activities, so pack comfortable shoes and check the weather before you arrive to make sure you pack appropriately for rain, etc.
Richmond is located in the mid-Atlantic region on the East Coast, and is about 100 miles south of Washington, DC. The average temperature in the city is 33 degrees Celsius (91 degrees Fahrenheit) in the summer. Pack layers! While it is hot outside, Americans rely heavily on air conditioning inside, so it can get pretty chilly during your orientation sessions. We recommend bringing a sweater or jacket with you to all orientation activities.
Dress code
Daytime orientation sessions - All daytime orientation sessions/activities are informal, so dress comfortably and for weather/air conditioning (see above). You will be engaging with various VCU faculty and administrators as well as IIE/Amideast/ECA staff, so we recommend dressing comfortably but appropriately.
Dinner Tuesday night - On Tuesday evening, you’ll have an informal group dinner reception with various VCU faculty and administrators. I would call the dress code for this dinner “nice informal.”
Dinner Wednesday night - On Wednesday evening, you will have dinner in small groups with local families and volunteers, either in their homes or at their favorite Richmond restaurants. This will be another “nice informal” occasion.
Dinner Thursday night - The closing dinner on Thursday night will be the most “formal” event. You can leave your ballgowns and tuxedos at home, but if you’d like to dress up a bit, this will be the night for it! We’ll call this “business casual,” or “business formal” if you’re feeling fancy.
Packing list & currency exchange
Be aware that if you are bringing any electronics (computers, hair dryers, cell phone chargers, etc.) from your home country, you will need an adapter/converter to use U.S. outlets. The U.S. operates on a 120V supply voltage and 60Hz.
The hotel has a rooftop pool, and it will certainly be hot enough to enjoy it, so pack your bathing suit if you’d like to take advantage of it!
If you need to exchange currency for U.S. dollars, we recommend doing so at your port of entry or larger airport. The Richmond Airport does not have a currency counter, and you will not have time to visit any banks or exchange offices during the orientation.
Exploring VCU & Richmond
Because of the large amount of content that we need to cover in just a few days, we are not able to incorporate much time for you to explore VCU and Richmond. For lunch Tuesday and Wednesday, we’ve left the time fairly unstructured to give you the opportunity to explore the VCU academic campus a bit if you feel so inclined. A VCU campus map is included in your folder.
If you are interested in exploring Richmond more (and it is worth exploring!), we recommend that you either arrive in Richmond before August 12th or depart after August 16th. If you’d like to do so, VCU staff can recommend housing options. Please note, though, that your housing is only covered for the program dates (Aug 12-16), so you will be responsible for all travel/housing costs outside of these dates.