A woman driving a white minivan pulled up to the information booth on Hoy Road at Cornell and rolled down her window.

"I'm trying to get to Bartels Hall to register," she said, slightly breathless. Her husband in sunglasses sat next to her in front while two young women in the back were surrounded by suitcases and a laundry basket filled with neatly folded clothes.

The scene was repeated again and again Aug. 18, Freshman Move-in Day, as students and their families tried to negotiate a new campus, registration and moving into dorms. At four separate locations, Cornell Association of Professors Emeriti (CAPE) volunteers, such as retired physicist Bob Cotts, answered questions to help the newcomers get where they needed to go. Each freshman had a specific three-hour window to move in.

"We give them advice on where they can go while they wait for their unloading time," said Cotts, one of 45 CAPE volunteers each working two-hour shifts.

On North Campus, Hilary Gehman, the freshman women's rowing coach, stood outside Balch Hall dormitory behind a sleek women's-eight racing shell, complete with tie-up shoes fastened to the floor. As the freshmen of all backgrounds, shapes, heights and ethnicities walked by with their families, Gehman had her eye out for a specific type of young woman.

"There's definitely a physical build we are looking for," said Gehman, looking for prospects to recruit for her team. "Tall and strong. Taller women tend to make better rowers," she said. She was headed next to the Helen Newman Hall swimming pool to check out the women at the freshman swimming tests, required for all first-year students.

Nearby, in the commons outside Clara Dickson Hall, families drove their cars onto the grass for quick unloading.

"I need a driver with the car at all times," Brendan Miller shouted to some people standing near an empty van. Miller, a junior in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, was supervisor for the Dickson Hall move-in. He said students appeared to pack lighter this year than last.

"There are always a couple of people who have a boatload of things, but they seem to be fewer this year."

While Marlene Bessette of Rochester said she was melancholy about her son leaving home for school ("The thing my mind keeps returning to is that from this point on he will only be visiting me"), her son, A.J., was excited about the future as he stood in line to check into Dickson Hall.

"I love it so far," he said. "It feels great." A good friend from his high school will also be living on the same dorm floor.

Outside Mews Hall, students stood with their parents amid clusters of suitcases, lamps, books and bicycles. They waited in the sun for their turn to enter the dorm, as red-shirted volunteers scurried about, helping students move in.

Debashis Ghosh, a research oncologist at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, waited next to a pile of his son Deborshi's belongings, including a set of golf clubs. Deborshi, a Cornell Presidential Research Scholar, is interested in chemical and biomolecular engineering, and he has been encouraged by his father to study for a professional degree and pursue a career in science or engineering.

"We are all coming from scientific, professional backgrounds," said Ghosh, whose wife, Chaitali, is an assistant professor of mathematical statistics at Buffalo State College. "So he has been exposed to science and research. He's inspired, and that was part of coming to Cornell." Deborshi was also accepted into Johns Hopkins University.

Another parent, Gloria Thomas of New York City, said her daughter, Chrissa, admitted to feeling pressure as she approached the start of her college career.

"I said to her, no one's ever put pressure on you your entire school life, and you should do whatever makes you happy," Thomas said, adding that Chrissa has always been entirely self-driven.

Chrissa Thomas was salutatorian of her class at York Prep High School in Manhattan, and she plans to study biology and eventually go on to medical school. Her class valedictorian is also attending Cornell this year.

At a reception under a large shaded tent on Rawlings Green on North Campus, President David Skorton, dressed in a cool white Cornell polo shirt, and his wife, Robin Davisson, wearing striped capris and sandals, greeted parents and students. The tent was filled with people mingling around the cheese, vegetables and dip, bread, fruit and cookies on the refreshment tables.

Nearby, Hotel School freshman Jeremy Epstein of Bernardsville, N.J., who chose Cornell over acceptances at Brown and Washington University, said he plans to study hotel administration with a concentration in finance but will also take pre-med classes to leave open the medical school option.

"I'm excited to go to the Hotel School," he said, although he was slightly less enthused about his dorm room in Clara Dickson Hall.

"I wasn't overly astounded by the room," he said. "It's an old place. The heater looks around 40 to 50 years old."

Another student, Dan Brown of Bridgewater, N.J., was "a little worried" about Sunday's placement exams in math and chemistry. Neither he nor his new roommate, Max Tomlinson of Los Angeles, appeared concerned about Monday's swim test, an exam that Skorton and his wife announced that they also plan to take.

Skorton said he also considers himself a freshman, so he might as well take the test.