DePauw Students Meet and Greet

Thursday, August 23, 2007
Kelli Kennedy grabs a bottle of water at Martin's Emporium during the annual DePauw Freshman downtown tour Tuesday evening. This year's freshman class has 694 students with 45 members coming from 19 foreign countries. The students were taken in groups around the downtown square where they received waters, popcorn, coupons and luscious deserts. The evening was capped off with entertainment and food on the northside of the square.

Every year there is an annual event for new DePauw students and local merchants to meet and greet one another. Tuesday evening over 690 new students filled the downtown as they toured the area with guides who gave them the ins and outs of downtown Greencastle.

The entering class is one of the largest in recent years. It includes more valedictorians and salutatorians than the group that arrived in Greencastle in August 2006. There are also 45 new undergraduates from 19 foreign countries. Students arrived from 35 different states in the U.S.

The students chanted back and forth and danced for each other on the corner of the courthouse square. They received tastes of popcorn, candy, deserts, flowers, coupons and water from merchants before heading to the northside of the square for sandwiches and music.

Last week students were welcomed to the university by DePauw President Robert G. Bottoms who spoke with them at the opening convocation.

"We have worked so hard at DePauw in getting ready for you to come into our community," he said. "And we have attempted to create the kind of community that has enough diversity in it from all over the world and all over this country," he added.

Bottoms, who has led DePauw since 1986 told the new students,"We've created a laboratory so you can begin to learn to cooperate with people with other cultures. Interact and learn from the students in your class who may come from a different culture, from a different background. We need this kind of cooperation, this kind of learning, if we're to change the way we live over the next few decades."

The speech was the President's final address to a new class. He announced in April that he will step down as president of DePauw next summer to become Chancellor of the University.

"I trust at DePauw you will read your texts carefully," Bottoms said. "You will have your imagination stimulated, you will learn to live with determination. You will leave this place in four years determined to use your education to make a difference in the world."

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