Oh hey, prospective students.
How are you enjoying Allegheny so far?
Have they told you all about the fun sober activities they offer on weekends?
About the “unusual combinations” that will indubitably enrich your undergraduate education?
Did you hear that we offer skydiving as a sport and that one prominent student rides a unicycle around campus?
Isn’t Allegheny great?
Well, yeah, it is, but not for any of those pre-packaged reasons.
We worry that sometimes all that sugarcoating during these visit weekends may make you sick.
So while you’re here, do your best to get to know the real Allegheny, the school that hasn’t been primed and polished and packaged for your consumption.
You’re off to a good start, reading The Campus—we hope to offer you factual reporting, anything but constructed statements and selling points.
But get to know the potholes in the cobblestone streets that make every ride down Highland Avenue a rollercoaster.
Get to know the icy snow that blankets our sidewalks at six months out of the year.
Get to know the food that has at times made McDonald’s seem gourmet.
Get to know that awful, suffocating feeling you get trying to find a seat in the crowd at McKinley’s at lunchtime.
Get to know the terror you are sure to experience when traffic keeps barreling down on you in the crosswalk.
Don’t stop at the negatives, though.
Get to know the beautiful greenery within walking distance of every dorm on campus.
Get to know the professors here, the gems in every department whose classes you never want to leave.
Get to know the friendly workers at McKinley’s and Brooks.
Head into town and chat up the waitress at the Market House Grille; she’s probably got some interesting Meadville anecdotes to share.
Take a walk through Diamond Park—you may see Mayor Christopher Soff and his wife strolling by.
Check out the artwork at @The Bank and the crazy variety of used books at Tattered Corners.
Stop in at Second Chance for a cheap pair of killer boots.
Most importantly, just talk to people.
Everyone in this community has a story to tell about their Allegheny experience.
We may gripe and we may groan, but there truly is something unique here.
And we don’t want that to get lost when you’re participating in all of your Admissions-approved activities.
Your tour guide, your host, the Admissions office and every other too-friendly too-smiley face that you’re going to encounter this weekend means well.
But you’re doing yourself a disservice if you only do what the schedule in your folder tells you to.
Before Allegheny was all about unusual combinations, we liked to think of ourselves as wonderfully weird.
So don’t settle for a normal weekend when you have every opportunity to keep it weird.
Don’t let the sugarcoating turn you off.
Don’t let the sales pitch bring you down.
Experience Allegheny, experience Meadville and draw your own conclusions.