Light the Way: The Campaign for Berkeley

The Transfer Student Center at Cal was amazing! It is hard to be a transfer student because you already feel behind when you arrive. I took an orientation class through the center my first semester and learned about campus resources, how to talk to professors, and the Berkeley community. The center’s wonderful staff were the ones who helped me when I needed housing, convinced me that my admission wasn’t a clerical error and that I actually belonged at Cal, and stepped in when I ran out of money on my printer card an hour before a paper was due. I spent many hours there studying and making friends with other students in similar situations. I’m not sure what I would have done without the support and encouragement of the Transfer Student Center team. I also want to give a shout out to my college roommate Debra, who was the first person I met at UC Berkeley. Fourteen years later, she is still one of my closest friends and recently welcomed her first baby, Cal — short for Calvin!