As her brother drives the van behind Hamilton Hall and parks, Andrews is relieved that she still has eight minutes before her first-year seminar begins on the building's fourth floor.
But in those eight minutes, Andrews has quite a bit to do.
Disabled since birth, Andrews starts by hitting a button on her key chain, which causes the van's sliding door to open and a ramp to unfold onto the asphalt. She then maneuvers her electric wheelchair in a three-point turn out of the van.
Clutching her notebooks and a clipboard cluttered with angel stickers in one of her arms, Andrews hits the button on her key chain once again. She waits as the two-paneled ramp recedes back into the van and the door slides shut.
Satisfied, Andrews parts from her brother. She runs her hand through her copper colored chin-length hair and then wraps that hand around the joystick-like controller on her wheelchair, heading toward Hamilton.
"When I get the money, I can get a car to drive to school," Andrews says with a devilish grin as she scoots up the walkway. "It's so fun to drive." She says she hopes to save enough money before she graduates to pay the $6,800 needed to equip a car so that she can control it. If Andrews isn't able to find the money, she has some other options. "I'm hoping that when I get out of school, I'll be so poor that I will get grants," she says with a little laugh.
Andrews is one of about 450 students with self-identified disabilities on campus. These students navigate campus, set apart by wheelchairs, guide dogs and hearing aids yet trying to get the full UNC experience. "I really think when coming to this University, individuals are accepted for their individualness," said Jim Kessler, director of disability services. "(Disabled students) are as a part of the mainstream as everyone else, which goes back to the University trying to be very accessible."
As the eight spare minutes are whittled down to five, Andrews makes her way up the ramp in front of Hamilton and mashes the large button with the universal handicap icon. She waits for the door to open, then wheels into the lobby area.
Andrews is mostly quiet once the class starts. She listens to her classmates' comments on Islamic conceptions of love and mystical experiences, later explaining that she often prefers to observe rather than participate in class discussions.
Professor Shantanu Phukan brings up possitivity -- the loss of control that comes with a mystical experience. Phukan asks students for suggestions about other categories of people who also must deal with a loss of control over their surroundings.
He makes a list on the chalkboard of what the students say, writing down older people, the uneducated, poor people and prisoners. One girl suggests handicapped people, and while Phukan briefly mentions it, he neglects to add the word "handicapped" to the list.
Andrews shows no reaction at the time but later says that she found the student's comment unfair. "I don't think I don't have control," she says with slight indignation. "I've worked my entire life to have control, and people don't actually get how smart I am and how capable I am."
Andrews prefers not to identify herself with her disability -- spinal muscular atrophy, a type of muscular dystrophy.
SMA affects voluntary muscles for crawling, walking, swallowing and head and neck control. Senses, emotions and intellectual ability are normal in people with SMA, and many are unusually bright and sociable, according to the Families of SMA Web site.
The doctors who treated Andrews as a baby originally thought her condition was degenerative and told her parents that she would be dead by age 10. It wasn't until she had back surgery in the fifth grade that doctors were able to fully diagnose Andrews' condition.
While Andrews' parents searched for the best schooling and equipment options in Danville, Va., they didn't dwell on her condition while she was growing up. "It's just me living my life. It hasn't been the most important thing in the whole world."
But when choosing a college, Andrews waged a war of wills against her parents. Andrews wanted to go far away. Her parents wanted her to stay near home. They met in the middle -- Andrews could go away to school as long as she lived off campus with either her brother Cutler, a junior at UNC, or her sister at the University of Virginia.
Andrews says she chose UNC because of its accessibility. "I haven't come across a building I can't get into. I might need some help getting into an elevator, but overall, it's not that hard to get around."
After her first class ends, Andrews goes back to the parked van before her next class -- Psychology 10, also in Hamilton.
She switches notebooks, then makes her way back to Hamilton, this time heading toward the double doors facing Lenoir Dining Hall. A couple of students are talking in front of the entryway as Andrews approaches. One of the students quickly moves to open a door for Andrews, and another then hits the handicap access button that opens the door leading to the lecture hall ramp.
"Most people open doors and are really helpful," Andrews says about students on UNC's campus. "It's a lot better than in high school."
She says most of the students at her public high school were scared of her disability, sometimes picking on her because they didn't know how to treat her. But at UNC, where people are more accustomed to seeing students with disabilities, Andrews says she doesn't get harassed.
But there have been some instances when students have made Andrews feel uncomfortable. "Sometimes they'll act not interested when they walk by and then they'll turn around and look."
Still, Andrews says UNC is an improvement from her high school, where she was the only student in a wheelchair.
Weaving her way around the ramp in Hamilton's lecture hall, Andrews parks next to another girl in an electric wheelchair and chats with her before class.
The focus of the class session is deviant behavior and feelings of personal anxiety. Professor Robert Lawson starts talking about what forms an individual's personality. "You spend a large part of your life adapting to your looks," he says. "The biggest problem for most college students is their appearance. It's what most college students are anxious about."
Andrews, wearing a trendy black turtleneck sweater and jeans, listens but says she doesn't view herself as that different even though being confined to a wheelchair makes her stand out from most students.
"Back in high school I realized I never blended in, and that's why I wanted to go to a big campus is because I wanted to blend in," she said.
For the most part, Andrews says she fits in at UNC but that she hasn't truly had the freshman experience, mostly because she's living off campus. "People don't invite me to things because they don't think I can go, but I can. It just takes a little more planning."
Andrews says she wants to meet more people next semester. She hopes to join clubs and maybe a sorority. But she admits that she's not sure how the Greek community would receive her. "It's a lot of money to pay, and I don't know if they'd judge me."
After Andrews leaves Psychology 10 -- her last class of the day -- and directs her electric wheelchair down the walkways toward the Wilson Library parking lot, she starts talking about future plans. With a business degree and a creative writing minor, Andrews says she hopes to open her own business one day. She wants a rich husband and children who she can take care of with the help of a nanny.
While those dreams are adapted to the lifestyle necessitated by Andrews' disability, they are not limited by it. "I always see myself as everyone else."
The University Editor can be reached at udesk@unc.edu.
