Golden Knights are People Too: SLU Senior Goes Undercover at Clarkson

By Ally Friedman – Managing Co-Editor

It’s hard to believe that only a month ago I was trailing behind a tour guide, notepad in hand, eagerly surveying another new campus. Like every other school I visited in my college search, I was squinting at the students, peering inside residence halls, and trying to picture myself living and learning here. At Clarkson University.

Holcroft House, the Clarkson Admissions Office, is a beautiful old building that emanates historical significance and is probably haunted. It looks nothing like the rest of campus. In the crowded lobby of Holcroft House I immediately take out my phone and begin tweeting and texting, so that everyone will realize I am cool and have many cool high-school aged friends.

At 11 o’clock, I follow my tour guide, Ben*, out of the lobby and onto the porch. The girl next to me is leaning against a derelict pillar with her eyes closed while Ben gives his introductory spiel. I am afraid she might topple all of Holcroft House.

The tour begins in the Fitness Center, where Ben begins to discuss his involvement in five different intramural sports teams. I find this unrealistic. Now seems like as good of a time as any to inquire about Clarkson’s rivalry with “the school down the road… St. Lawrence, is it?”

Ben explains that he has a cousin who goes to SLU. “Now I can’t speak to her ever again,” he says. I glance at the other audience members and try to gage whether they think Ben might be joking. It is impossible to tell.

Then Ben goes on to express his unbridled terror regarding this year’s SLU v. Clarkson hockey game. He explains that the game will be held at SLU, “and its on Halloween… I’m a little worried,” says Ben.

The next portion of our tour centers on residence life at Clarkson. Ben explains the varying options for housing on campus, including different “themes” among residence halls. These themes are “a great way to connect with people who share your interests,” says Ben, and he goes on to list some of Clarkson’s theme housing options: Women in Engineering, Honors Students, Robotics, and Professional Women.

It is inside Clarkson’s CAMP (Center for Advanced Materials Processing) Building, where Ben really shines. He leads us through a few different rooms that are essentially supervillain lairs where Clarkson students invent new batmobiles and stuff. I notice many exposed electrical wires and sharp objects.

While Ben is explaining “SPEED Teams”, in which Clarkson students compete to build the best batmobile, I decide to wander a little ways past a “Blade Crossing” sign to investigate a wind turbine. It would seem that Clarkson has its own “Wind Turbine Blade Test Facility.”

Ben seems a little anxious, but not all too concerned about the fact that I am poking at turbine blades. He doesn’t say a word when I walk into the Information Technology office and start asking a white-haired man about what he’s doing on his computer (by the way, Clarkson students have to pay extra for IT services!)

Since Ben is giving me very little attention, I throw myself into the task of “stumping the tour guide” which seems like it will be a useful exercise for everyone in our group. The other students are so far mute, but I’m sure they are secretly thrilled that I am asking everything they’ve always wanted to know about Clarkson.

I proceed to test Ben’s knowledge on a range of fascinating and original topics related to campus life. When asked whether the University’s lopsided male to female ratio affects the social scene, Ben responds, “I don’t think so, because it’s actually just 70% male and 30% female.” Speaking of, how much does much does Clarkson interact with other schools in the area? “We are very friendly with both SUNY Canton and SUNY Potsdam!”

For the most part, Ben provides candid and thoughtful responses to each question I ask. Standing inside Clarkson’s radio station (which, for the record, is a beautiful facility), Ben gives a sincere report of the rocky relationship between Clarkson’s student government and TV station after I said, “How tolerant is the University regarding issues of free press?”

When asked, “If you could change one thing about Clarkson what would it be?” Ben lists not one but three different aspects of Clarkson that have challenged him over the years. In response to, “What is there to do for fun around here, anyway?” Ben rattles off ten unique activity ideas from Potsdam to Malone.

The only topic that really stumps him is, “What is the climate like for issues of rape and sexual assault on campus?” To this, Ben responds, “We have a Women’s Studies department but I’m not exactly sure what they do.”

By the end of our tour, which lasted precisely an hour and forty minutes, I am delighted to see the chimney of Holcroft House emerge behind Ben. Clarkson is exciting, but I am totally exhausted from walking around and looking at stuff.

So it came to be that on a rainy August day in 2014 my journey as a Golden Knight officially began. And promptly ended the minute my tour wrapped up and I returned to Canton and to my job as a summer Admissions Intern at SLU.

When I called the Clarkson Admissions Office this summer to schedule a tour for myself and my “cousin” (Megan McGregor ’15), it was not so much out of curiosity about Clarkson but out of a desire to recapture the feeling of being on the other side of a college tour. Combined, Megan and I gave over 150 campus tours this summer. Although I still crack jokes to prospective families about my own “college road trip,” in all honesty I can barely remember what it felt like to be a young campus tour-goer.

From Ben I learned that every tour guide engages their audience differently, and also that Clarkson actually has some impressive facilities (that house a lot of scary science experiments). I was excited to see how Ben would respond to the kinds of questions I always receive on tour, which is why I asked him so many tough ones.

More than anything, I am grateful to Ben, and to Clarkson, for giving me loads of new thoughts about how best to address prospective families’ curiosities and concerns about life in the North Country. I am also grateful to Ben for making me feel young again –when I came clean to him at the end of our tour he said, “I honestly thought you were in high school.”

*Tour Guide’s name has been changed for his own safety.