Hi, my name is Rohan Roy and I am from the San Francisco Bay Area. Like many of you, I am also undeclared but hope to pursue a degree in Accounting and potentially Economics. A bit about me is that I enjoy playing soccer, watching college football, playing ping-pong/pickleball, and playing poker with friends. I just started learning to golf. This past summer and senior year of high school has been better than I could imagine, getting to celebrate the closing of a chapter with so many close friends and family has been a time that I will never forget. My favorite memory of this past year was over spring break, I was in Hawaii with a few friends, taking some time to decompose and take in all the fun we had been having the past year, as well as relieving the stresses that came along with it. On our final morning in Waikiki, I woke up to check my phone to see if our flight was still on time and saw an email saying there was an update in my UCI portal. Once logged in, I squinted my eyes, crossed my fingers, and saw the first word in the letter: “Congratulations.” After that, the little Anteater confetti started to fall from the top of the screen and it felt like the biggest weight lifted off my shoulders. I finally felt like I had gotten into a school that I was proud to say I was going to; a great school academically, and in a great area. I hope that is how you all felt reading your acceptance letter, and I also wanted to say congratulations to you all.
In the last few years, I went to Southern California multiple times yearly for soccer tournaments, mostly in San Diego and Orange County. At the time, I never would have thought I would get to go to school in such a nice area.
The most recent time I went down was in late July this year for orientation. I remember in the seven-hour car ride down, it hit me all at once; that I was finally going to college. I was having a lot of mixed emotions. Although I was excited to be a college student, I was going to miss my friends from high school, seeing my parents every day, the familiarity, and the overall feeling of being a kid. Naturally, the nerves took over, and leading into SPOP I was very scared about moving on to the next phase of my life.
It was clear to me after being around and getting to know students from all over during orientation, that going to college can be an uncomfortable transition. Which can be even more challenging as an undeclared student trying to figure out what path to take academically. Moving forward, through this blog I hope to share stories about how I am dealing with this change, stepping out of my comfort zone, updates on methods that are keeping me grounded as well as things that I have found interesting in the classroom that may spark a new major interest.
Lastly, I want to congratulate everyone once for making it to this point in their journey, because we all know it wasn’t easy, and wanted to wish you all the best of luck for what the next four years will bring. It’s going to be a great year.