Photographing Our Great Students

We held our annual photoshoot this week, taking the many student photos that will populate the emails and brochures we'll send to prospective students over the coming year. We've been doing this annual shoot for a few years now, and it's just a blast. I love getting to sit and talk with these students between shots. I thought I'd share a few of their stories on the blog today:

• Lina Carballo (seated above right) is a senior biomedical engineering student. She took us to the lab where she is working with Professor Richard Goldberg on a project to develop tools for people with disabilities. All of the students in the class are working on devices that would interpret nerve impulses to control a hand-like instrument that will move an egg from one location to another. The technology could be used to help people who have lost the use of limbs or have other physical impairments. It was pretty amazing to see. There is a great Spotlight Story on Dr. Golberg's class that describes some of the other recent projects.
• Gabriel Whaley is a senior philosophy major who, together with his roommate, founded a non-profit called Kicking4Hunger. They run free soccer camps around the state in return for food which is donated to local food banks. Their aim is to help kids develop leadership and learn about healthy lifestyles, all while giving back to their local communities. Gabriel said that they plan to expand the project across the country and even to other parts of the world. After talking to him and his roommate, I have no doubt they will make it happen!
• Lauren-Kristine Pryzant is a sophomore business and economics major who co-founded Flash! Seminars -- small, one-time seminars on a wide variety of subjects taught by top faculty members. Think flash mob but with debate instead of dancing! Next week's topic is on math and art; last week students discussed the death penalty. 

It was a fun (and tiring!) two days of photography, but we met nearly 70 students who are all doing very cool things. We'll be featuring these students in upcoming emails and other publications, so you will likely hear more of their great stories. But now I have to get back to reading applications--they piled up while I was out of the office! Thanks again to all of you who applied for Early Action. Now we are hunkering down like squirrels for the winter. But with applications instead of acorns. And we're not going to eat the applications, just read them. That was a bad metaphor. Sorry. Anyway, thank you again to our EA candidates!