But although administrators can explain the Harvard University Police Department, the blue-light phones and the Core Curriculum, they can’t explain the difference between the Fly and the Bee.

For questions on the intricacy of Harvard social life, transfer students are offered a built-in network called Transferlinks, an organization made up of past transfers.

Amol K. Tripathi ’03, who is a co-chair of Transferlinks and an MIT transfer, says transfers are eager to become involved in the program and share their experiences with new students going through the process.

Transferlinks organizes dinners, parties and outings into Boston for the new students.

While Tripathi calls the transfers a “little community,” he says it is by no means a reclusive society.

Some transfer students remain heavily involved in the transfer network throughout their Harvard career while others, like Brian S. Fuchs ’04, say they were eager to get to know other non-transfers as well.

“I want to make my own friends and not just rely on the transfers,” he says.

Fuchs, who transferred from Brandeis, says he would characterize Harvard as welcoming, although he found the fraternity-driven Brandeis social life more accessible.

Broder says that although other transfer students are her closest friends, she has also had an easy time getting to know Currier House residents.

She also says she has enjoyed the community feel of the dining halls and the variety of the food, as well as Harvard’s sunnier rooms.

“Wellesley is in an isolated area. It’s a little closed off,” she says. “Whatever sun filters through the trees is all you have.”

Getting Acclimated

Many transfer students tell a number of stories about memorable first encounters with Harvard’s quirks.

At Wellesley, Broder says she had become accustomed to paying campus police to let her into her room whenever she was locked out.