During my childhood, I did not think the decision of choosing where to go to college would be a hard one. At the age of 2, my grandpa had taught me how to say, “Rock Chalk Jayhawk,” and from that point on, I was hooked on the University of Kansas basketball team.
While I still am a diehard KU fan, I realized in high school that there was a little more to going to college than cheering for a basketball team.
Once I figured out what all I wanted in a college, Baker University seemed like the perfect fit for me.
At BU, I have had the opportunity to be a part of three incredible organizations.
The thing I was most certain about coming into college was that I still wanted to run cross country and track like I did in high school.
It has been amazing to be a part of a senior class that has seen the cross country team go from the middle of the pack in the conference four years ago, to finishing 10th at the NAIA championship meet this past season.
The track and field teams have seen similar success by sending numerous athletes to the national meet, and will attempt to repeat as conference champions this weekend at Liston Stadium.
While head cross country and track coach Zach Kindler convinced me to run at Baker when I was a senior in high school, joining a fraternity is something I never thought I would do. Since a few of my cross country teammates were going through fraternity recruitment, I thought I would give it a shot to see what Greek life at Baker was like.
Joining Delta Tau Delta fraternity has been one of the best things that I could have ever asked for as an only child. The Gamma Theta chapter has also seen a tremendous amount of growth since my freshman year.
The house went from fewer than 20 men not too long before I joined, to having more than double that now. Delta Tau Delta has won the Five-Star Chapter Award for the best fraternity at Baker for five out of the past six years and earned the Hugh Shields award, which recognizes the nation’s top 10 Delt chapters, in 2010 and 2013.
The final organization I joined had plenty of success prior to me coming to Baker, and helped solidify my decision to go to BU.
Freshmen are unable to join the Baker Orange staff until the spring semester, but I had the opportunity to contribute right away. I was named the sports editor my sophomore and junior years, and got my leg twisted to apply for the editor-in-chief position this school year.
Since the Baker Orange had won the All-Kansas award as the best four-year private college newspaper in the state for 13 of the past 15 years, I was slightly nervous to keep the tradition going. It would be even more challenging with making a transition to go online-first and switch from a weekly to monthly newspaper.
Although serving as the editor was very stressful at times, the staff won the All-Kansas award again, and grabbed several other honors at the state and national level.
I cannot imagine how different my life would be today if I had not gone to Baker. While I will likely say Rock Chalk Jayhawk every time the KU men’s basketball team takes the court, I can always proudly say that I am Baker ‘Til I Die.
