New Tartans Woven into Community at 2024 First-Year Orientation
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From a certain vantage, the first-year students in groups of red, blue, yellow, maroon, purple, pink and green assembled to compete for the Carnegie Cup resemble Carnegie Mellon University's signature Tartan(opens in new window)(opens in new window) — a weaving of colors and line-weights that represent different thoughts, interests, backgrounds and skills coming together.
One of many First-Year Orientation(opens in new window)(opens in new window) events, the Carnegie Cup aligns incoming students at Carnegie Mellon by residence hall communities in a series of games and challenges.
The Tartan inspired "Woven Together," the theme of this year's Orientation. CMU welcomed more than 1,800 students of the Class of 2028+ to the CMU Community. Orientation programming at CMU is designed to provide the foundation for academic success, community membership, well-being, campus involvement and Tartan pride.
The Carnegie Cup is awarded after an extraordinary week of connections and learning about the university and Pittsburgh region. Students first arrived at their residence halls the previous Saturday, aided on Move-In Day(opens in new window)(opens in new window) by a dedicated cadre of orientation counselors.
First-year students and their families received a warm welcome Sunday morning from the president of Carnegie Mellon University, Farnam Jahanian(opens in new window)(opens in new window), who praised the students for being among the brightest of their generation.
“The next four years or so will undoubtedly be some of the most transformative of your young lives,” Jahanian said. “Your CMU education will give you every opportunity you can imagine to chase and achieve your dreams.”
At Community Collage, an annual Orientation event, first-year students experience the diverse talent of the student body.
Elaine Gombos, a sophomore studying computer science(opens in new window)(opens in new window), sang a portion of “Reflection” in both Chinese and English before she explained how embracing her mixed-race background meant embracing all the different parts of herself.
“It means the freedom to choose who I want to be,” she said. “I live in intersections, not boxes. I live in hues and blends, not solid colors. I am not 50% white and 50% Asian, but 100% Elaine.”
Jahanian(opens in new window) and the deans of CMU's seven schools and colleges officially welcomed the first-year students at a formal Convocation celebration on Thursday, Aug. 22.
Speakers called on the symbolism of the Tartan plaid to encourage the first-year arrivals to embrace their diversity and the bonds they will form with the community over the coming days.
"You will grow in innumerable ways, and discover passions that ignite your academic and professional careers. CMU will change you, and you will change CMU,” Jahanian said
See highlights from Orientation 2024.
