Class of 2018, welcome to Elon University. You are joining a truly special community. I envy you, for you are just beginning your time here at Elon. As a transfer student, my only regret about coming to Elon is that I didn’t arrive here sooner.
Everyone enters college with their own expectations or plans of what they wish to accomplish. Your expectations coming into Elon may not always match your experience – and that is not a bad thing. I challenge you to truly have an open mind as you begin your collegiate careers.
Entering Elon my sophomore year, I was interested in politics and simply assumed I would major in political science. That assumption drastically changed in the spring of 2013 when I took my first college philosophy class.
The name of the course was “How Should We Live,” and in all honesty, I forget how I ended up in the class in the first place. Looking back, I am very glad I took the course. What truly grabbed my attention from the very first day was that the class challenged long-standing beliefs in society. Every class we debated and wrote about issues that were important to us. I was hooked, and later that semester I declared my major – philosophy.
That was not the only time I was faced with change in college. I was thrilled to enter Elon as a member of the cross country team. My whole high school career had been aimed at running D1 and by coming to Elon I had fulfilled that dream.
Two years into that dream I suffered a devastating injury that forced me to take an early exit from the sport I love. However, if that injury had not happened, I would have never had the opportunity to meet new friends and find a new passion – serving as the opinions editor of the newspaper.
Change is not a bad thing. Although it may present itself in odd forms, such as a running injury or having your outlook on the world challenged by a philosophy professor, every experience here at Elon is an opportunity.
Now that you are college students, you control your own destiny. Elon provides its student body with a strong platform from which we grow as friends, students and members of the community. Do not wait to seek out all that Elon has to offer. Get involved from day one. It can be something as simple as introducing yourself to someone on your hall or joining one of Elon’s numerous clubs.
We all come to Elon in pursuit of something unique. Some come to meet new friends, some come to act or dance and others come in pursuit of athletic endeavors. At the end of the day, we are all one community of like-minded peers all seeking to further our education of the world around us.
With move-in day behind us, orientation activities completed and the classic icebreaker games done, you now enter the first week of your college academic careers. You now embark on one of the most exciting adventures of your lives. As the great Jimmy Stevenson (Elon ’14) once said, “Phoenix, we’re doing it”.
Welcome to college, Class of 2018.