In one of พรพรสำฦตโs most engaging annual rituals, about 1,500 members of the พรพรสำฦต family are gathering this month at locations across the country to โsend offโ 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: พรพรสำฦต alumni are there โ often literally โ to lend new students a hand.
Julie Bergeron โ75 hosted the Northern Vermont Alumni Clubโs 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 โ13, Alyssa Humphrey โ13, and Hannah Kinney โ13 swapped stories about roommates, their mutual interest in science, and their early impressions of พรพรสำฦต.
Alumni shared stories about พรพรสำฦตโs 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.
โStudents appreciate being able to meet other students, and I know that parents like to compare notes and ask questions of other parents and alums,โ said Bergeron, who still remembers her own send-off event in Westchester County, N.Y., in 1971. โCertainly, the alums who attend love meeting current and incoming students.โ