By Aidan Ruch

The Clarion interviewed twins Mathieu and Marcus Nichols, two first-year Bethel students. All four kids of the Nichols family will be attending Bethel this year. Micah, the oldest, in his last year, the twins in their freshmen year, and Maddy, the youngest, in her first year as a Post-Secondary Education Option student. When the twins moved into Edgren and Maddy moved into Nelson during Welcome Week, their parents displayed an #emptynest sign on their car.

AR: What is it like having all your family at Bethel?

Mathieu: I personally am really enjoying it. It’s fun because our older brother Micah knows what’s going on and everything. What to do, where to go…What not to do, as well. And we’ve got a younger sister here also.

Marcus: It’s good that she’s here because then she’s not home alone and this way we can keep an eye on her, and she been supportive of us. It’s nice having four siblings here.

Mathieu: It makes it really feel like home.

Marcus: Which it already did, but this adds another extent to it.

AR: What’s it like being a twin here at Bethel? Have you ever tried switching roles and showing up for different classes?

Mathieu: We only have one class which has been fun. We get to sit together and the professor knows what’s up.

Marcus: It’s a psychology class, so there are actually a lot of studies on twins, so the professor said that he was going to mess with us a lot and have a lot of fun.

Mathieu: And having a twin on campus is really fun. I’ve got a built-in roommate.

Marcus: Yeah, we’ve lived together our whole lives. It’s basically as if we’ve lifted up our stuff and brought it to a new place. It’s also nice because it gives you another network to connect with – different friends and people and a bigger social life. It gets your name out there and makes you part of the community.

AR: Marcus, you have had multiple open heart surgeries. What was that like from both your perspectives?

Mathieu: Two years ago Marcus had his last open heart surgery. So at that point in time we were both juniors in high school and it was good because the surgery went well and the recovery went well and there were a lot of people at school praying for him. It was really great because of that support we are able to be here at Bethel today. And the support here from all the kids at Bethel has also been really great.

Marcus: There was a lot of support at my public school, but the reason why I chose to go to Bethel was because of the support I got here. The football team actually sent me an autographed football with all their names on it. Just the warm community, the people who didn’t even know me but prayed for me and wished me well just because they knew my family made me feel like this was a place I could call home, a shelter.

This interview has been edited and condensed.