In one of Colgate's most engaging annual rituals, about 1,500 members of the Colgate family are gathering this month at locations across the country to "send off" the latest cohort of new students.
Alumni and current parents are hosting more than 40 events in private homes, restaurants, and parks.
For members of the Class of 2013 the events reinforce what they were told throughout the admission process: Colgate alumni are there -- often literally -- to lend new students a hand.
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Members of the Class of 2013 had a chance to meet fellow new students and alumni at a send-off event held at a team-building facility in Essex, Vt.
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Julie Bergeron '75 hosted the Northern Vermont Alumni Club's send-off at Northern Lights Rock and Ice team-building facility in Essex, Vt., as a way to attract more young alumni and their families and have them mingle with incoming students and older alumni.
The event built trust across the decades among the 30 participants.
Before ascending the ropes course, Katie Iadanza '13, Alyssa Humphrey '13, and Hannah Kinney '13 swapped stories about roommates, their mutual interest in science, and their early impressions of Colgate.
Alumni shared stories about Colgate's past and present, while the parents talked of practical matters such as packing and transportation.
Nonetheless, going off to college requires a certain leap of faith.
"Students appreciate being able to meet other students, and I know that parents like to compare notes and ask questions of other parents and alums," said Bergeron, who still remembers her own send-off event in Westchester County, N.Y., in 1971. "Certainly, the alums who attend love meeting current and incoming students."