When Kaitlin Miller arrived at UNC, she knew she was going to work in the healthcare industry but did not know what position or even where to start looking. She joined the Red Cross club in her first two years at UNC while she worked to fulfill the requirements for a nursing major. Kaitlin could tell that the position did not quite fit what she was looking for until she started talking with one of her friends about the Dental Hygiene program at UNC. Now a senior and a graduate of the 2015 class of Dental Hygiene, Kaitlin has a bright future ahead of her, a beginning promised by her hard work at UNC.
I was able to observe Kaitlin and her quiet, yet powerful, demeanor as we took pictures around the Dental School, then later on north campus. After fielding question after question to Kaitlin, and learning all that I could, I saw a person most people could look up to: a hard-working, competent, strong student and woman who knew her purpose and did all that she could to attain her goals. In our trials to get the perfect graduation-cap-throwing picture and fighting with the wind as it ruffled her hair, I saw her humor and her enthusiasm toward her major as she talked about the program with Jaehee, also a graduate of the 2015 class of Dental Hygiene.
At this time of year, we had to jockey for a position at the Old Well. Prospective students and their parents, tour guides, and other graduating students all vied for the coveted photo spots as the azaleas bloom in the background. Both beginnings and endings were captured in the photos around the Old Well, the dichotomy between the graduating seniors and the rising first-years struck me as metaphoric to what all college students face. For the rising first-years, it marks the beginning of their university careers, each welcoming future triumphs, failures, and hours of study and play while the seniors commemorate the end of their university years in their caps and gowns around UNC’s historical landmark. Throughout the photo shoot, Jaehee and Kaitlin reminisced about the past four years, giving me advice on how to make the most of my UNC career. Although this could be seen as an ending of a chapter in their story, I saw it as a beginning for them. UNC could never be considered anything other than a beginning, opening new destinations daily and providing the chances that make lifetimes.
For Kaitlin, this was the Dental Hygiene program, and for the other prospective students posing with the Old Well…Well, they’ll have to figure it out like the rest of us.