Hal Burroughs of St. Louis assembles a flat screen television as his son, Michigan freshman Tim Burroughs, looks over his shoulder with roommate Arthur Lee of Rochester Hills. They were moving into the University of Michigan's South Quad Wednesday afternoon. Melanie Maxwell I AnnArbor.com

Sweat rolled down Hal Burroughs’ face as he worked to screw the stand onto his son’s 32-inch LCD television today in a stifling South Quad dorm room.

His son, Tim, an incoming freshman, cracked a window for a minute before realizing the air outside wasn’t going to be much help.

“It’s too hot in here,” Hal said. “We’ve got a fan unpacked yet?”

“Yes,” Tim said, “But it’s somewhere in the other room.”

Fans were at a premium in rooms all over campus as students, parents and friends sweated under the weight of mini-refrigerators, futons and other sorts of luggage. Move-in week at the University of Michigan hit full stride today. 

Move-in will continue for the next two days as Michigan’s student body returns to campus in advance of the first day of classes next Tuesday.

A record number of students - pushing 10,000 - will live in student housing this year, said Peter Logan, a spokesman for the university’s housing department. That prompted housing officials to repurpose some lounges into rooms and even send some first-year students to units at Northwood Community Apartments, typically home to graduate students and students with families.

This is also the first year students will be moving into the newly finished North Quad residence hall. Logan said that although the official move-in day for North Quad isn’t until Friday, about half of the students assigned to live there are already moved in. Students can pay $75 per day to move in early.

Getting belongings into rooms was the first stage of move-in.

To help with that, U-M deployed more than 900 student helpers to man big blue carts to schlep items up to rooms.

Senior Aleksandar Silijanowski was among those. His challenge mid-afternoon was to get a large futon still in its box up to the third floor on South Quad. 

His solution? Slide it off the cart, squeeze it into the elevator, stand it on its end for the short ride up, then slide it on the carpet down the hall to where it was headed. He dropped it off and headed back downstairs for the next trip, the sweat covering the front of his T-shirt testifying to his hard work and the hot weather.

Michigan senior Aleksandar Siljanovski of Sterling Heights assists Jan Turner of Toledo with a futon during move-in at the University of Michigan's South Quad on Wednesday afternoon. Melanie Maxwell I AnnArbor.com

The second stage? Getting it all together in some semblance of order.

Tim Burroughs and his roommate, Arthur Lee, were figuring that out while Hal, a law school alumnus, worked on the television. They had a futon placed on one side of the room and desks shoved up against the other wall. The television was going there for now.

Elizabeth Oliver, a senior majoring in business and a resident advisor at South Quad, watched from the doorway of her room while families streamed past.

She offered a bit of advice for moving in.

“Bring less than you think you’ll need," she said. "There’s not a lot of space, and you can always get something later if you really need it.”

The third stage of the move-in is the most emotional - the good-bye.

A couple years ago, Logan was serving ice cream at a residence hall during move-in. “It seemed like every mom who came out was sobbing,” he said.

That wasn’t the case Wednesday afternoon at South Quad.

“My son told me not to cry,” said Erin Wolthuis of Jenison as she left South Quad. “He’s pretty excited about coming year for his first year, so I’m excited for him. We’re going to have dinner together tonight before we go home, so I think that’s when it will hit me. It’s going to be a quiet ride back home.”

David Jesse covers higher education for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at davidjesse@annarbor.com or at 734-623-2534.