The Berlin Wall
Happy Monday, Deac families! Your Deacs are too young to have ever experienced the Berlin Wall in real time, but this week on Manchester Plaza, there is a cool project related to it:
“Walls Fall Down” on Manchester Plaza is a community art project to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall will be held as a Graffiti Contest starting October 21st at 9:00 a.m. and ending October 25th at 5:00 p.m. on Manchester Plaza.
Help us celebrate this anniversary of the end of oppression in East Germany by decorating a panel of our ‘Berlin Wall’ in response to the question, ‘What walls hold us back?’ A panel of judges will choose three winners at 5:00 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 25th. Winners will each receive a gift card!
Then the real fun begins! We will be destroying the wall right after the contest ends at 5:00 p.m. Stop by and get your own whack at the wall and enjoy some free pizza. You will also be able to take a piece of the wall home with you as a reminder that together, we are strong enough to bring down the walls that hold us back.
Project Sponsors: Department of German and Russian; Wunderbar Together: Germany and the U.S.; Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany Washington; @GermanyinUSA”
I found out about the Berlin Wall project via this week’s Letters So Dear, which are sent to first-year students. As always, Letters So Dear contains a message from an upperclass student. This week’s letter is from a wonderful student I know, Janie Weber (’21). She shares some terrific advice, including this:
“The best advice I received from a mentor of mine was to find a spot on campus that is entirely your own. For a lot of freshmen, this is the first time that you are constantly surrounded by people. It can feel like you have to be social and put together every second of the day. But, no matter how extraverted you are, that is not reality. Everyone needs a spot where they can be unbothered by roommates, classes, friends, etc. This has been my secret trick my entire time at Wake, and it has truly made a big difference in my experience here.
You may not realize it now, but it is so freeing to have a spot on campus that you can call home. Maybe you’ll journal there or simply sob your eyes out. I urge you to do this, so for the days that your roommate seems to live in your room and you feel like you can’t escape, you have created a little haven for yourself. Maybe you find serenity in the swinging chairs outside of Scales. Or maybe you go to one of the tables in the gym. It could even be a quiet spot by your HES class! Wherever you choose, pick a spot where you feel like you can escape into your own world. I promise it is something you will carry with you throughout your years at Wake.”
Read the full Letters So Dear here. Also, we have a new Weekly Message for First Year Families, and this week’s topic is Time Management and Overcommitment – which honestly is something parents and families of all years might want to read, given how busy our students make themselves.