Register staffer shares her first visit to UConn
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| Zack Sosnovich with UConn mascot Jonathan |
By Jean Falbo-Sosnovich
Register Correspondent
As the mother of a high school junior, the daunting
task of thinking about college is upon me.
It seems like only yesterday when I waited at the
bottom of my driveway for the big yellow school bus to carry my son Zack off to
kindergarten. With his Spongebob Squarepants backpack slung over his little shoulders,
Zack embarked on his school career.
Fast forward a decade later, Zack, now 16 years-old
and almost 6 feet tall (and yes, he has since traded the Spongebob backpack
for an Under Armour one), is a junior at Woodland Regional High School in Beacon Falls.
Before
I know it, he’ll be sporting a cap and gown, graduating with his fellow
seniors in the Class of 2014. Yikes! But between now and then, some major
decisions about ‘what to do next’ will need to be made.
I’m sure lots of kids Zack’s age have some idea of
what they’d like to major in at college, but not Zack, not yet anyway.
We
thought the Yankees might be holding a spot open for him somewhere in the
outfield, since he has pretty mad baseball skills, but then quickly I snap back
to reality. So, instead, when we heard about UConn’s annual open house, held
last month, the family jumped in the car and headed to Storrs to see what the
iconic college could potentially have in store for Zack.
Met the infamous Jonathan
I’ve actually never been to UConn, and as we
approached the campus, I marveled at how it looked like its own mini-town.
Remember I’m a Valley girl, so New Haven, Stamford, and Bridgeport seem like
big cities to me.
We checked in at Gampel Pavilion, and just seeing
the big dome in person, where many a basketball championship has gone down, was
kind of cool. It was also pretty neat to see Jonathan.
Don’t know who Jonathan
is? I didn’t either until we came upon a larger than life statue of UConn’s infamous
Husky dog mascot. Of course, we all posed for pictures with Jonathan for
posterity.
The campus was bustling with fellow wide-eyed high
school juniors and seniors from all over. At every turn was a UConn
student, clad in blue and white rugby shirts, making them easy to spot as tour
guides for the day.
Those with a clue of what they’d like to pursue,
i.e. engineering, nursing, education, were able to attend specific
presentations. We, on the other hand, checked out the presentation for
undecided majors, and were surprised to find out the man giving the talk
started out wanting to be a dentist, ending up majoring in biology and landed a
job at UConn mentoring kids undecided about majors. A lesson in irony, for sure.
We also got a tour of the campus, courtesy of two friendly
sophomores who knew the place inside and out. We ended the day’s events with a
tour of a dorm room, one shared by three guys, which was surprisingly clean and
didn’t reek of dirty socks.
You may wonder what Zack thought of the experience,
especially since it was his first time setting foot on a college campus. He
thought it was “cool” and a place where he could maybe picture himself going. But
I guess only time, and my pocketbook, will tell.
And anyone who’d like to offer us newbies some
advice on how to navigate this whole college process can certainly drop me a
line at jean.sos@snet.net.
