VOL. 23, NO. 1	SEPTEMBER 5, 1997

Joshua Ratner, CC'98, coordinator of the 8-day New Student Orientation Program, which was run entirely by students. Record Photo by Amy Callahan.

aving just delivered his teenage daughter all the way from Miami to her first day of orientation at Columbia College, Tony Decoteau stood atop the College Walk stairs and took a good look at the place.

  "I wish I had come here," he said. "What I love about this campus is you're part of a separate community, but you're in a major metropolitan community as well." The clincher, though, in the decision to select Columbia, was the Core Curriculum and the education the University will provide, he said.

  These enthusiastic sentiments were widespread on campus as the Class of 2001—for the College, the School of Engineering and Applied Science and Barnard—arrived in mini-vans and station wagons to begin their four-year adventure at Columbia.

The 975 members of the Class of 2001 gathered with their families for the Columbia College convocation in Levien Gymnasium last week. Record Photo by Joe Pineiro.

  "Ask any alumnus or alumna, these years produce some of the most vivid memories in their lifetime," President George Rupp said in his welcoming address. He urged the Class of 2001 to join in building a pluralistic community at Columbia, one that is, he said, "rich in diversity but that also takes pride in standing on common ground." One-in-four of the entering students, Rupp noted, comes from families where neither parent has a college degree, and one-in-three of the entering students is in a minority group.

  "You are never, ever going to get this opportunity to be around so many diverse people with so many amazing ideas," said Colleen Mulleedy, CC'98, vice president of the Columbia College Student Council. During the Dean of Students assembly last Tuesday, she encouraged her fellow undergraduates to actively participate in the life of the school: "You have to invest in Columbia to get a full, rich experience."

After a morning drive from Washington, D.C., Christina Batipps, CC'01, and her mother, Joyce, prepared to move her small mountain of worldly possessions into Carman last Monday. Record Photo by Amy Callahan.

  This Columbia College Class of 2001 is the most selective in the history of the school, having broken application records last year with more than 11,000 high school seniors seeking admission. Only 17 percent of the applications were accepted.

  Across Broadway, in her greeting to parents, Barnard President Judith Shapiro welcomed them into the Barnard community: "Your daughter's Barnard education, in its depth and breadth, will provide the intellectual and cultural capital that she will draw upon for the rest of her life."

  Shapiro cited Barnard as ranking third among four-year private colleges in the number of graduates who receive doctoral degrees, and ranking fifth (behind Michigan, Stanford, Cornell and Harvard) in the number of women who become medical doctors.

Amidst the station wagons and mini-vans pulling to the curb on Broadway last Monday, Barnard President Judith Shapiro greeted incoming first-year Sarah Kroll-Rosenbaum, BC'01, at left, and her mother. Record Photo by Amy Callahan.

  The Orientation Week activities—organized and run by an devoted brigade of upperclassmen—was open to all first-years and transfers in the College, SEAS and Barnard. The week offered incoming students a series of issue forums that opened lines of communication on subjects including "Roommates—Making It Work," "Knowing Someone Gay," and "How Not to Gain the Freshman 15."

  Also, a series of professor forums exposed the first-years to various fields of study. The topics included "Artificial Organs in the 21st Century," "Feminism Today," and even "Taxidermy, Edith Wharton and American Literature: Studying Stuffed Animals and Other Interdisciplinary Matters."

  And of course there was plenty of less cerebral distractions: a Mardi Gras dance, human bingo, tickets to the David Letterman show, a walking tour of Harlem, a night sail to the Statue of Liberty and a downtown trip to the Nuyorican Poet's Cafe.

  But as Mulleedy warned, the games will end when classes begin: "This feeling of summer camp will be over next week." And the true Columbia odyssey will begin.