Guest post written by Parasto Sadeghi
As we say goodbye to the graduating class of 2015, there is already a group of students who are eagerly looking forward to start their journey at UBC.
Soon after joining the UBC Recruitment Team, I repeatedly found my fellow colleagues reminiscing about ‘Destination UBC’. Nearly every time the words ‘Destination UBC’ were mentioned, it was coupled with the following sentence: ‘It is a BEAST but so worthwhile’.
With a passion for event planning, I was excited to see what this monumental event for our prospective students had in store. Now with two Destination UBC events under my belt, I can confirm that it truly is unlike any other welcome event in Canada. The feedback from both students and parents was remarkable and confirmed that all our hard work and planning was worthwhile.
While there were many highlights to choose from, I would like to share with you my top Destination UBC memories:
- New friendships: it was truly incredible to see how quickly students form new friendship and upon saying goodbye, reminding each other that it is, “only a couple months left until we are back here again”.
- The Opening Ceremonies: the energy as 2500 students and parents (Vancouver event) gathered together in the War Memorial Gym was truly palpable.
- Dinner Music: we were particularly lucky to have our four unbelievable Destination UBC Student Coordinators (Al, Hassan, Ella and Blake) supporting us throughout the event. We could not have done this without them, as they helped us make Destination UBC fun and provided a student perspective. Thanks to their connections they were able to secure three Kelowna bands and a DJ for our Okanagan event.
- UBC enthusiasm: UBC pride was on full display. It was exciting to see that every hour more students would show up in UBC branded clothing. The bookstores on both campuses were running low on merchandise as Class of 2019 proudly purchased their first UBC items as a UBC student.
Thank you to all ES staff that helped making Destination UBC such a success!
Fun facts: Two cities – Two weekends – 4000 participants from across the country travelling from as far away as Saint John, New Brunswick, all resulting in two unparalleled events, new friendships, endless smiles and possibly even an 80%* increase in UBC bookstore memorabilia sales (*anecdotal claim).