When Ariel Larsen made the decision to enroll at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, the deciding factor for her was the sequential arts program.
“(At) colleges, arts aren’t usually a big program,” the Westminster resident and incoming freshman said. “So the fact that art is such a big program here is really fun.”
What drew in Ariel’s mother, Dawn Larsen, of Frederick, to the campus during their recent visit was the tight-knit feeling she experienced.
“I’m taking away a huge family atmosphere and how you take care of people,” Dawn Larsen said. “There’s so many services here that weren’t available when I was coming through college. And the fact that the sequential arts program is as significant as it is, is amazing to me.”
The Larsens were one of a few hundred families flocking to the nest as UMES hosted its New Hawk Day student orientation event on campus.
The two-day event, held July 28 and 29, aimed to help new students, who are incoming freshmen or transfers, get prepared and acclimated ahead of the start of the new academic year.
The orientation featured panels, parent and student one-on-one sessions, placement exams and advising, and a tour of the campus.
The newest kettle of Hawks came from throughout the state and the region, including Maya Bridges, a criminal justice major from Springfield, Mass. Bridges said being able to attend an HBCU, and one in close proximity to her home, would be beneficial in giving her unique life experiences.
“I just hope to meet new people and have new experiences that I never got to have before,” she said. “Just the different ways that Black people are represented … the differences in everybody’s lives (that are) different from mine.”
Bridges, who wants to pursue a career in social work, also wants to test her mettle in another avenue as a walk-on softball player.
“I played softball for 13 years and I (saw) that they had a (Division I) program, so I was kind of drawn to that also,” she said.
Ray Stevens, of Bowie, said when her son, Mike, applied to college there was only one stipulation her son had to follow.
“We are a legacy family of HBCUs,” she said. “One of the criteria for my kid applying for college was that he could only attend an HBCU. He can choose which one he wanted to go to, but he had to attend an HBCU. I have to write a check.”
Ray Stevens said her son had done the entire application process himself and she didn’t know about her son’s decision to attend UMES until he was accepted.
“The tour is actually what sold me,” she said. “This is an (absolutely) gorgeous campus. More importantly, arriving here, it gives you a calm feeling, which I like to say is a quality of life feeling.
So, I feel it will give him a true balance coming from the city into this area that it will open him up to new experiences.”
Dawn Larsen said that UMES’s status as an HBCU exemplifies the closeness that many other colleges may be missing.
“I think that it’s giving that family value,” she said. “Because, there are so many people who are coming to college for the first time, so many families who are joining colleges for the first time, and so you have a huge audience for that and you have so many supports for that that it helps even students who aren’t people of color or aren’t first-generation college students. It’s helping those people as well.”
