Monday, February 24, 2014

How I Chose Fordham

While I was in high school, I really did not know what I wanted to do with my life or where I wanted to go to college. However, there were a few things that I knew were absolutely necessary for my future college. Fortunately, Fordham managed to fit all of my requirements and my mom's sole requirement that my college could not be too far from home. 

My first requirement was that the college had to have a beautiful campus. This annoyed my dad to no end, but it was very important to me that I have a pleasant place to live. I grew up in a beautiful rural area, and I had no intentions of moving away from a place that I loved to a place I found hideous. Fortunately, Fordham has an absolutely beautiful campus, and the landscaping crew works very hard to keep it that way! 
 
My best friend and I visited Fordham together at the end of our Senior year of High School!
My second requirement was that I wanted a diverse education. While I was planning on majoring in Business Administration, I wanted to study other things as well. However, I really was not sure what I wanted to study. Fordham's Core Curriculum has definitely helped to clear up that issue! 

Fordham's Core Curriculum exposes students to many subjects that they would otherwise never explore. While some of my core classes have not been my favorite subjects, I have loved others. From taking my Theology core requirements, I have discovered a true passion for the subject, which has led to my minoring in Theology. Theology may be very different from Business in some respects, but values and morality are increasingly becoming topics of interest in the business world! 

My final requirement was that my college needed to be located in a location where I would easily be able to find internships and, eventually, a job. This turned out to be one of the more difficult requirements for my college because cities are often the best location for finding internships and jobs. However, colleges in the city are often not very beautiful, and I absolutely insisted that I had to have a beautiful campus. Thus, this requirement dramatically decreased my list of schools. However, Fordham was not eliminated from my list due to its ideal location in New York City. 

I can see the Empire State Building from my dorm, but I decided to go see it up close one day!
Now that we can see that Fordham fit all of my requirements (i.e. it has a beautiful campus, a diverse education, and ideal location) and my mom's requirement (Fordham is less than two hours away from home for me!). However, there was one other aspect of Fordham that really made it too good for me to pass up. 
 
As an incoming student in Gabelli, I was accepted into the Global Business Honors Program (GBHP), which has been an absolutely amazing experience. It is a rather small group of students (about 20 per year), and we work very closely together through our honors classes, which challenge us academically, but also teach us more about business on a global level. Additionally, we travel together on three Study Tours. Last Spring, the freshmen went on a Study Tour to London and Paris where we met with many different businesspeople to learn more about European business. This Spring, the sophomores and juniors are going to Beijing, and I cannot wait to go! I knew before being accepted into GBHP that Fordham was the college for me, but being a part of the program has only made me love Fordham more.

We could see Tower Bridge from the London office of Ernst & Young
Everyone at Fordham has their own personal reasons for coming to Fordham, but everyone seems to find his or her place at Fordham as part of the Fordham "Ramily." The idea of going away to college was something that really stressed me out after graduating from High School, but the one great thing about Fordham is that all of the students really make you feel at home while you are away from home. 

The day I moved on campus, I was made part of the "Ramily"

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