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Aug. 18, 2006
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Destiny
Returning students may
appreciate the expansion of the often crowded sidewalk between the Coates University Center and Northrup Hall more than our new students. This was one of
about 80 minor Physical Plant/grounds projects completed this summer to improve
our campus.
Similarly, as always happens in early August, the parking lots have been re-striped, speed-bumps have been painted, and lane dividers have been brightened.
We are ready for you – new students and continuing students alike. The Resident Mentors and Resident Assistants have completed orientation; advisors have gone through workshops; and faculty members have revised course material and performed research.
So are you ready for us? All of our students get a fresh start. If you are new to Trinity, you get a chance to explore your identity and test independence. If you are a returning student, your quest for meaning, your time to clarify your values, and your maturation toward adulthood loom as opportunities and challenges alike.
In any case, you are the masters of your own destiny. How will you make the most of it? In the classroom, you can be engaged or not. You can do the readings, show up prepared, focus on the material, and develop a relationship with the instructor. Or, you can roll out of bed (regardless of the time of day), throw on a baseball cap and deodorant, and head up the hill only to snooze through class and hope you won’t be noticed.
Out of the classroom, you can let your mind turn to mush as a regular contributor to Facebook, become the hall champion of the latest Madden video game, and spend all of your time Instant Messaging your high school pals. Or, you can take risks, meet people who you might not otherwise get to know, listen to the life-stories of our international students, and attend lectures and programs that will help you stretch who you are rather than reinforce who you have been.
You have opportunities to learn on so many levels during your time as a student. You can take the easy path and drink too much, sleep too much, and be on-line too much. Or you can take advantage of every moment and every relationship you encounter. You can challenge authority, express opinions, listen and share, consider and re-consider, and decide that others count – but so do you.
Our job is to widen the paths and to show the way. The speed bumps we put out there (grades, policies, challenges) will hopefully slow you down enough to learn important lessons.
Your job is to take advantage of what lies in front of you: to choose the paths best suited for you, to learn the short-cuts, to set your plan, and to move forward. The process has a beginning and an end. It is the unfolding journey that will determine your experience here. And hopefully somewhere between your first day and graduation, you will become the person you are destined to be.
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