Columbia Spectator News

Commencement 2012

Ayelet Pearl — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

Array

Schaffler, dean of financial aid, to step down

Margaret Mattes — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

Laurie Schaffler is stepping down as dean of financial aid after less than a year on the job.

Schaffler, GS ’92, is moving to Seattle to live near her two daughters, one of whom is pregnant with Schaffler’s first grandchild.

“I came here from Washington state about 20 years ago to go to GS and do my writing degree, and I’m going home,” Schaffler said. “I’m going home to be near my girls and be near my grandchildren, and to figure out what I’m going to do when I get out there.”

Schaffler was named financial aid dean last summer, after Daniel Barkowitz left to become executive director of his synagogue in Needham, Mass. Schaffler believes that during her short tenure as dean, she has helped make the financial aid office run more smoothly and efficiently.

Last semester she hired five temporary employees to help ease the burden on her office, which handles financial aid for Columbia College and the School of Engineering and Applied Science. As of Tuesday, the office had processed financial aid packages for more than 600 continuing students, even though it is usually just starting to process those packages at this point, Schaffler said.

The five temporary employees will soon become full-time employees, two of them year-round and two of them seasonal. Schaffler credited CC Interim Dean James Valentini, SEAS Dean Feniosky Peña-Mora, and Dean of Student Affairs Kevin Shollenberger with helping her secure funding for the new employees.

“We’ve put ourselves in a much better position from a resource perspective, and it’s been completely because of the support of the deans,” she said.

Schaffler also started an internal review of the financial aid office after being approached with the idea last semester by Karishma Habbu, CC ’13, who has since been elected Columbia College Student Council president. The office sent out a student survey and conducted focus groups with students, and a staff focus group will be held soon.

According to Shollenberger, most of the assessment should be done by the end of the month. Schaffler said that a “very baseline” report will be prepared by the end of the summer.

“We’ll work off of that as we go into the future,” she said.

Schaffler, though, won’t be around to see the results of the assessment. She said that she’s been “feeling the urge to be near my girls for a while.”

“I have a very intense relationship with my children. I raised my kids by myself—I was a single mom,” she said. “By the time I was 27 I was single with three kids.”

Schaffler doesn’t have a job lined up in Seattle, but she has some ideas of what she wants to do when she gets there. First and foremost, she will continue her hobby of making “fabric art,” sewing poetry into beaded quilts.

Schaffler, who earned an M.F.A. in poetry at The New School in 2009, might also try becoming a teacher or a life coach. She said she has some “irons in the fire” at a few institutions of higher education in Seattle.

Shollenberger said that it might be a while before a new financial aid dean is hired. Before beginning a search process, he would like to finish the assessment of the financial aid office and also look at ways tweak the office’s reporting structure, possibly adjusting the responsibilities of the dean of financial aid and the director of financial aid.

Schaffler’s resignation becomes official at the end of the month. Even if she doesn’t know exactly what she’ll do next, she said she’s excited to find out.

“Most importantly I’m going to be a grandma, and pursue art,” she said. “And hopefully I’ll find a job so that I can land on my feet.”

news@columbiaspectator.com

Senior profile: Sadie Zukowski, SEAS

Finn Vigeland — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

This story is one of a series of profiles of 2012 graduates. See all senior profiles for this year here.

Civil engineering major Sadie Zukowski loves architecture. So it’s only fitting that a few nights before graduating, she and her friends took pictures from the top of every building on campus.

Zukowski, who grew up in a small town in Connecticut, said she knew from an early age that she wanted to apply to Columbia. She discovered an appreciation for engineering’s practical applications, so she applied early to the School of Engineering and Applied Science.

When she arrived on campus, she realized she had a “fundamental interest in architecture and the way that buildings and structure take shape,” she said, motivating her to major in civil engineering.

But as she got more involved with civil engineering, she started to find it “a bit restricting,” she said. While still fulfilling the requirements for the civil engineering major, Zukowski began exploring computer vision, artificial intelligence, and music interpretation on the side.

But even though she’ll be pursuing a master’s in artificial intelligence at the University of Colorado, Boulder, next year, she said that if she could redo her four years at Columbia, she’d still major in civil engineering.

“The kids in that major were so great to be around and are now some of my closest friends here,” she said.

Zukowski stressed that her friendships were the best part of her college years.

“Columbia taught me how to interact with people—I very much fit the stereotype of the awkward engineer,” she said.

But she hasn’t formed relationships just with her peers. “All of the chefs at John Jay know me very well because of my food allergies,” she added with a smile.

Over the last four years, Zukowski was heavily involved in musical groups, playing the French horn with the Columbia University Orchestra and several chamber groups. She has performed at Carnegie Hall twice, and she was also the secretary of the Tae Kwon Do club team last year.

Academically, Zukowski is proud of the work she did to redesign the roof of the Williamsbridge Oval Recreation Center’sdrainage system in the West Bronx. She took on this project with a few classmates in her first-year Gateway class.

As a junior, Zukowski received the DAAD Research Internships in Science and Engineering fellowship, which allowed her to spend the summer in Germany studying construction safety and applications of radio-frequency identification.

Zukowski urged students to get to know their peers better and to “go and talk with your friends outside, at night, around campus.” And that’s her best advice—unless you’re trying to take pictures from the top of various buildings, and structures, around Columbia.

“My advice to anyone who is going to take a picture on top of ‘The Thinker’: Hold on to his hand and behind the calf and pull yourself up,” she said.

news@columbiaspectator.com

Senior profiles

Spectator Staff — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

The class of 2012 includes student council presidents, record-breaking athletes, and founders of campus arts institutions. As they graduate, Spectator asks about their past, present, and future.

News
Daniel Alonso, CC, by Ben Gittelson
Sarah Dion, CC, by Yasmin Gagne
Adam Iseman, SEAS, by Michael Zhong
Vincent Nguyen, GS, by Emily Neil
Maddie Provo, BC, by Abby Abrams
Sara Snedeker, BC, by Avantika Kumar
Jacqueline Thong, GS, by Madina Toure
Kevin Zhai, CC, by Lillian Chen
Sadie Zukowski, SEAS, by Rakhi Agrawal and Finn Vigeland

Sports
Pat Lowery, CC, baseball, by Eli Schultz
Mike Mazzullo, CC, soccer, by Mrinal Mohanka
Kyle Merber, CC, track and field, by Charlotte Murtishaw
Sammy Roberts, SEAS, fencing, by Spencer Gyory
Melissa Shafer, CC, basketball, by Rebeka Cohan

Arts & Entertainment
Pat Blute, CC, theater and film, by Jade Bonacolta
Galen Boone, BC, Postcrypt, by Charlotte Murtishaw
Anna Cooperberg, CC, fashion, by Alison Herman
John Goodwin, CC, theater, by Christin Zurbach
Yin Yin Lu, CC, lexicography, by Stefan Countryman
Erica Weaver, CC, creative writing, by Lesley Thulin

At Columbia College Class Day, Harper's publisher analyzes texts

Lillian Chen — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

Harper’s Magazine publisher Rick MacArthur, CC ’78, opened his Columbia College Class Day address with a joke.

“I realize that many among you are disappointed that I am not the president of the United States,” he said. “I want you to know, I share your disappointment.”

CC’s Tuesday morning class day ceremony was a much quieter affair than Barnard’s Monday commencement ceremony, where President Barack Obama, CC ’83, was the keynote speaker.

But that didn’t stop the college’s more than 1,000 graduates from celebrating their graduation and looking back on their time at Columbia. Senior class president Sarah Chai said that the experiences “that are most quintessentially Columbia” are those “not advertised by admissions officers,” describing her first time eating a slice of Koronet pizza.

“Columbia has undoubtedly become a place of many firsts for us,” she said.

MacArthur’s speech in many ways reflected the Core Curriculum, as he spent much of it “analyzing texts,” as he put it. He described his difficulties reading the "Marx-Engels Reader," a Contemporary Civilization text, quoting Karl Marx extensively.

“I was trying, really trying to understand, but the German Ideology Part 1 was more than I had bargained for,” he said.

After quoting a particularly dense passage, he said, “I went back to the text, as I know all of you do, and reread the whole damn thing.”

MacArthur, a former Spectator news editor and a member of Spectator’s board of trustees, also discussed Obama, saying that the president misread former Columbia English professor Edward Said. According to a recent biography of Obama, the president once called Said a “flake” more interested in literary theory than actual text, an assessment with which MacArthur disagreed.

“As a Protestant-baptized Palestinian-American who attended British colonial and American schools, Said was himself decontextualized as an Arab, permanently out of place,” MacArthur said. “Said’s sense of deracination, of never quite knowing where he came from, is something Barack Obama should know all about.”

Continuing his analysis, though, MacArthur said that he ultimately does not believe Obama considered Said a flake, because “the grown-up Obama is a serious, intelligent person who attended Columbia College, where he learned how to read past the obvious and the superficial.”

“My hope is that none of you seniors would shrink from such a reading assignment or such a political risk because of your exceptional Columbia College education,” he continued. “The role of the intellectual, a Columbia intellectual, is to be prepared to tackle any text.”

“My advice to all of you today … is to absorb, to question, to challenge, to refute any author on any subject—or for that matter, any politician or commencement speaker,” he added.

Graduate Kalasi Huggins said that while MacArthur’s address wasn’t his “ideal graduation speech,” it was “well-executed.”

“I thought it was relevant, and it definitely addressed the Obama issue, and he did it in a comical way which offset the animosity and the tension,” Huggins said.

MacArthur’s discussion of Core texts served to highlight a point made by Columbia College Alumni Association president Kyra Tirana Barry, CC ’87.

“The Columbia experience is very powerful,” Barry said. “It spans the years and generations.”

There were several speakers besides MacArthur, including Barry, Chai, University President Lee Bollinger, Columbia College Interim Dean James Valentini, and salutatorian Zachary Levine. Valentini referenced a tagline once used by Jeep: “The things we make, make us.”

“At Columbia, we are not manufacturers,” he said. “But we do forge citizens, scholars, scientists, artists, writers, and leaders.”

Levine thanked his classmates for making him “feel comfortable” in his own identity after he came out, discussing the ways that Columbia orients and disorients students.

“What we believe and know is dependent on how we were raised, relationships we’ve formed, accomplishments and accidents and blessings that we’ve had along the way,” he said. “The presence of a queer community … made the disorientation, the dizziness, feel good and beautiful, and uncomfortable in the best sense.”

“This is a familiar story to each of us,” he added.

Chai encouraged her classmates to remember their peers as they “continue to take chances and take charge.”

“It’s the people that you met here at Columbia who have helped shape you into an even more incredible person than you were when you first came to Morningside Heights,” she said.

lillian.chen@columbiaspectator.com

Senior profile: Sarah Dion, CC

Yasmin Gagne — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

This story is one of a series of profiles of 2012 graduates. See all senior profiles for this year here.

Sarah Dion calls herself “someone who’s really drawn to tradition and family.” With the people she’s mentored or helped at Columbia, that family is pretty large.

Dion was a coordinator of the Columbia Outdoor Orientation Program, organizing five days of programming for hundreds of first-years, and a volunteer for Columbia University Emergency Medical Services, providing medical assistance around Morningside.

The Columbia College senior served as a leader for BOP, the biking program, before becoming coordinator in her junior year. She described being a leader and taking new students on the four-day trip in August as “the best thing ever.”

Dion said she identifies with COÖP because it’s one of the places she made most of her friends. “I can point to the person in COÖP who was like, ‘This is the thing I was involved in, this is really cool, you should check it out.’”

She was also involved for the last two years with CU-EMS, formerly known as CAVA, and served as a crew chief for the past year.

“COÖP and CAVA have been a huge part of my Columbia experience. They were my most formative experiences at Columbia,” she said.

Dion is staying on campus for some of the summer to work for CU-EMS. “It’s a group of people I definitely care a lot about,” she said. “It’s been a really interesting way to be part of the campus community” as well as the city, as non-Columbia affiliates who live in Morningside Heights frequently make use of the service, too.

Dion said she has learned that it can often be hard for students to find their place on campus. “It’s baptism by fire here in a lot of ways, especially if you’re trying to be a part of an organization,” she said.

If students communicate with each other, she said, it can make that process easier. “When you see someone who you know, say hello, smile at them, wave whatever,” she said. “If I’m in a grumpy mood I totally want to talk to someone else.”

She said she would advise students to “do your academics. There’s so much that people get out of here that I didn’t do.”

“I wasn’t really loving the classes I was taking,” Dion, a biology major, said. “I was always more interested in the classes my friends were talking about, and I think I should have actually done something about that.”

She has developed strong friendships through COÖP and CAVA, one of the reasons she said she loved her time at Columbia. “I just like being on Low Steps and watching everyone go by and saying hi to people. That’s the thing I’ll miss the most,” she said.

“As much as academics are important, make time to just hang out with people, if someone comes up to you and says, ‘Hey, do you want to get lunch?’ ... do it. It’s always time well spent,” she said.

Having lived in the Living and Learning Center her first year, she said she thinks taking that time to have lunch with students in different class years is invaluable. “Being a freshman and being a little naïve is pretty great,” she said.

But now that she’s a senior, she said, “you have so many opportunities to think about what the last year has been. There’s so much opportunity for feeling really happy and nostalgic.”

Dion said the thing she will miss most from Columbia is the daily interaction with her classmates. “It won’t happen anymore when we go into the real world,” she said, “but it’ll be good, it’ll be different.”

yasmin.gagne@columbiaspectator.com

Senior profile, Kevin Zhai, CC

Lillian Chen — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

This story is one of a series of profiles of 2012 graduates. See all senior profiles for this year here.

Going into senior year, Kevin Zhai wanted to shift his priorities. In his previous three years, he had put in a lot of time and effort as the chair of the Asian American Alliance, as a Sigma Nu brother and treasurer, and as a varsity swimmer.

“I wanted to focus on academics this year, which I definitely haven’t been able to do,” he said.

Instead, he spent most of his time this year heavily involved in student life again, mainly working on finance initiatives like student project grants as the Columbia College Student Council vice president of finance.

When he was approached about being on a CCSC executive board ticket, he debated what to do. But ultimately, it was such a “unique opportunity” that he couldn’t pass it up, he said.

After working on the organizational level as the chair of AAA and then on the board level as an Activities Board at Columbia representative, Zhai said he wanted the chance to work on the council level.

“I had already kind of planned out my life, and I really wasn’t anticipating this part,” he said of CCSC.

A busy four years at Columbia is partially why he’s decided to turn down a paralegal job at a law firm downtown next year in favor of moving back to his hometown near Seattle, applying to Ph.D. programs, and working on personal goals.

“I’ve spent the past four years running around like a chicken with its head cut off,” he said.

He hopes to accomplish practical goals, like learning to cook and working on a lifelong habit of staying fit, as well as “more whimsical” goals, like learning how to drive stick shift and practicing French with a pen pal.

Zhai transferred from the School of Engineering and Applied Science to Columbia College after his sophomore year to become a philosophy major, although he continued to pursue science by concentrating in physics. He had sold himself as a math and science student when he applied to college, but he ultimately realized that physics was the only math or science field that appealed to him.

“It was a huge turning point in my life,” he said of the transfer. “The whole point of these four years in my life is for me to develop myself as a person.”

“My dream is to go into academia,” he said, though he added that “it’s definitely not an easy road.” He said that getting into a top Ph.D. program and getting a job afterward are both incredibly tough.

“Ultimately, I think it’s the one thing I really, really care about and can see myself doing,” Zhai said, adding that he’s mainly interested in Eastern philosophy. “It gives me the freedom to really explore a lot of things and ask whatever questions I want to ask.”

Other defining experiences of his college career were spending four years on the varsity men’s swim team and being a brother of the Sigma Nu fraternity.

Zhai initially pledged Sigma Nu because “it was like the ‘swimmer fraternity.’” Since then, more recruiting has been done outside of the swim team, which has given him the opportunity to form friendships he wouldn’t have otherwise had.

“My main social group is still the swim team … That definitely provides the most stability,” he said. But “there were also a lot of opportunities in Sigma Nu where I could meet other people that weren’t on the swim team,” he said.

College was also a place of personal discovery for Zhai, and he said that being honest with himself and others by coming out has added depth to his friendships.

“Once you get to a certain age and a certain point in your life, the deferral of your own happiness no longer becomes a sustainable endeavor,” Zhai said. “You have to do things now that make you happy. If you’re going to sit and wait for happiness to come to you, it never will.”

lillian.chen@columbiaspectator.com

Senior profile: Jacqueline Thong, GS

Madina Toure — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

This story is one of a series of profiles of 2012 graduates. See all senior profiles for this year here.

Jacqueline Thong, who has been president of the General Studies Student Council for two years, arrived at Columbia a classically trained ballet dancer. She had begun taking dance classes at the age of five, and she eventually danced with a contemporary ballet company, traveling to countries including Australia, China, and Singapore.

“My mom was a dance teacher, so ever since I was young I was surrounded by dancing and studios,” Thong said.

Thong was born and raised in Ipoh, a small town in Malaysia, and she initially struggled to adapt to American culture.

“I didn’t understand any of the cultural references or the sports references,” she said. “I didn’t know which team belonged to which city, and that was challenging as an international student.”

Thong said that despite New York City’s fast pace and high cost of living, there is something transformative about the city—you can try new things and go to fancy parties, she said, but you can also “take a stroll in the park and lie on the lawns at Columbia and read a book.”

Before coming to GS in 2008, Thong spent two years dancing in Montreal, where she met her future fiance, Chris, a graduate of the School of Engineering and Applied Science. She made a deal with him—if he would walk her through the application process for GS, she would reward him with a dinner date.

“Chris encouraged me to come to school,” she said.

Thong took a few dance classes at Columbia, and she was a member of the ballroom dance team her first semester, but she didn’t pursue dancing because of an injury that prevented her from dancing the way she had before. She is majoring in sustainable development, a topic she became interested in after learning about the development of Third World countries in a class with economics professor Xavier Sala-i-Martin.

“I tried out so many different things—economics to art history, even architecture—and then one day, it just came to me,” she said. “Columbia just offered sustainable development [as a major] two years ago, so it just appeared, and I knew that was what I wanted to study.”

Thong served as computer program coordinator for adult education at Community Impact during her first two years at GS, but she spent all four years as a member of GSSC.

Michael Rain, who was GSSC’s vice president of policy when Thong got to Columbia, suggested that she join the council after she voiced concerns about the American Language Program. She was GSSC’s international students representative during her first year and vice president of finance during her sophomore year.

Thong said that as GSSC president, she tried to connect GS students to one another, while also helping GS students become more connected to the overall University. She cited the other undergraduate student councils’ support during the recent rescheduling of GS Class Day as a sign of improved cross-school relationships.

“I’m proud of how far we’ve come ever since I’ve joined GSSC,” she said. “We’re taking little steps, but I think every year we’re building on something else. One day we will get to a much more integrated community on campus.”

After graduation, Thong will continue working with a few friends on an entrepreneurship venture called Advisoray, an online platform that connects users with experts in different fields around the world. The group, which is working out of Thong’s apartment in the Financial District, launched the venture a few weeks ago.

“We’ve been working on it for a few months, especially the development phase,” Thong said. “The beta version of the site is already live and we have real users testing it right now. I don’t know where it’s going to take me, but I’m excited.”

madina.toure@columbiaspectator.com

Senior profile: Sara Snedeker, BC

Avantika Kumar — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

This story is one of a series of profiles of 2012 graduates. See all senior profiles for this year here.

Sara Snedeker was a tour guide for the Barnard admissions department, a Delta Gamma sister, and a member of Barnard’s Student Government Association. But she said that serving two years as Barnard’s only student representative in the University Senate was “the most satisfying thing I’ve ever done at college.”

“I’ve just had the opportunity to meet people from the Business School, from the Law School, from the medical school, from the Journalism School, and, you know, every school that people have probably never heard of,” Snedeker said. “I just think it’s such an amazing thing to see all these students come together and work together towards universal goals that apply to the whole community.”

Snedeker was instrumental in pushing the senate to endorse public course evaluations, which it did in a 44-12 vote last month. Snedeker helped lead a Student Affairs Committee effort to develop and draft a course evaluations resolution, a yearlong initiative that required faculty, administrative, and student support.

“People were listening to what we were saying and were taking us seriously, and I was just so proud of being able to do that for students,” she said.

Snedeker also focused on building community as a Barnard tour guide, a job she’s had since she was a first-year.

Giving tours allows her to “give people a window into what makes Barnard so special,” she said.

“I remember that my visit to Barnard just made such a big difference in where I decided to apply to school,” she said. “It wasn’t really something that was on my radar—I ended up coming here and just loving it, and I kind of hope I’ve done the same for students.”

Snedeker added that four years of being a tour guide have helped her to grow as a public speaker.

She is also a four-year member of Delta Gamma, a sorority she pledged to “on a whim” in her first year but one that she now considers a tight-knit network of friends.

“I just have a very distinctive memory of joining my first year and, on Bid Day, feeling like this was a great decision,” Snedeker said. “Because I just wasn’t sure if I would like it, and I just remember feeling this enormous sense of welcoming and pride and happiness, and just feeling like, ‘OK, I’m never going to be bored again.’”

“It’s such a great group of women,” she added. “They’re really involved in the Columbia community as a whole, and I think that’s something that characterizes us in general.”

After commencement, Snedeker will vacation in Italy, but she’ll then return to in New York City—something she’s always imagined herself doing—to work at a strategic communications firm. Looking back on her four years at Barnard, she said she is glad she tried new things before committing herself to a few activities.

“Just completely go after everything you think you want to be involved in, and kind of let the chips fall,” she said. “It’s very hard to know what you want to do when you first get here.”

avantika.kumar@columbiaspectator.com

Senior profile: Maddie Provo, BC

Abby Abrams — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 EST

This story is one of a series of profiles of 2012 graduates. See all senior profiles for this year here.

Asked how she would describe herself, Maddie Provo turned to her friends for help. She received answers ranging from “weird,” to “sings a lot,” to “the Ruth Bader Ginsburg of making people feel good.”

This eclectic mix of responses reflects Provo’s many different roles on campus. She was a representative to Barnard’s Board of Trustees for the college’s Student Government Association, she helped found an improv group, and she served as a Barnard Speaking Fellow, a Constellation Leader, president of the Yiddish Club, and morale co-chair for Dance Marathon.

At Barnard’s Commencement on Monday, Provo won the Frank Gilbert Bryson Prize, which is voted on each year by Barnard seniors. The award is meant for a student who “has given conspicuous evidence of unselfishness and who has made the greatest contribution to Barnard during the college years,” according to Barnard’s website.

In addition to her participation in the improv group, Control Top, Provo acted in and worked on shows for King’s Crown Shakespeare Troupe and Columbia University Players. She said some of her best memories of Barnard include the “funny ladies” she’s worked with in Control Top and the team’s coach, Justin Grace, a former Columbia student whom team members call “Poppa Bear.”

“Doing improv, and especially doing improv with our coach, has given me a new approach to analyzing a lot of the things that I see,” Provo said. “He’s just really caring and compassionate and really giving of his time and his energies with us.”

During her time on SGA, Provo worked on issues like Greek life and campus space constraints. She said that being a representative to the board of trustees opened her eyes to the inner workings of the college.

“As students I think it’s really easy for us to be like … ‘This institution exists for me, for me,’ which is true on a lot of levels, but it’s also important to be like, ‘Oh, administrators also work here, and faculty work here,’” Provo said. “It’s cool to be forced to think about something that isn’t just yourself, while at the same time repping students hard and trying to make our voices heard on that front.”

Considering her many interests and activities, Provo said she “really just lucked into” finding her majors, psychology and Yiddish. She declared her psychology major sophomore year, thinking she might want to be a psychologist, but she soon discovered that her real passion was Yiddish, and she designed a Yiddish major for herself.

“I’ve always been really interested in religion, particularly Judaism, even though I’m not Jewish,” Provo said. “I had a friend who was going to be taking a Yiddish class and she asked me if I wanted to join her, and so I did.”

This summer Provo will work as a research assistant, helping Barnard English professor Pam Cobrin with a book, before heading off on what she called “one of those obligatory post-college Europe visits.”

Provo plans to spend time with her grandmother in South Carolina in the fall before returning to New York.

“I’m going to get a day job of sorts, and I’m going to try to do theater,” she said. “I’ve finally admitted to myself that I want to do theater, and I’ve given myself a sort of three-year limit.”

Provo said that one of her favorite parts of being a college student was “being surrounded by awesome, kick-ass women and men.”

“I’m definitely going to miss the people. But I want to put it on the record that I think this is the real world,” she said, referring to college. “I don’t like it when people are like, ‘What’s it gonna be like in the real world?’ Am I in purgatory right now? This is something. I don’t know how real or unreal it is, but it’s not unreal.”

abby.abrams@columbiaspectator.com