This past weekend, St. Lawrence welcomed more than 1200 parents and family members to campus. There was an air of excitement from both families to see their kids, and students to show their parents around. The majority of the parents were here for first-year students who proudly showed off our campus.
In the spirit of celebrating family, a lot of international students who could not see their families due to distance, got together and shared a large dinner at the I-house. The food was either ordered or cooked by the students themselves which hopefully helped them feel like they also had a family within SLU peers.
It was a wholesome experience for them and it showed just one example of how supportive students here at SLU can be to people from all backgrounds and cultures.
There was a large number of Alumni parents who came to visit their children and support SLU sporting events. Among those Alumni was Jahmosi Hay ’20, who spoke about how his mother was impressed by SLU’s improvements. “She’s an alumna so she saw that there were changes but she said that the changes, were better for the school,” Hay ’20 said.
He then commented on the changes his mom had been most impressed by: “Some of the dorms are better, they moved Dana and the Pub from when she went here. The Pub was in the Noble Center and Dana was in Lee.”
It was hard for Hay to imagine a time where Lee and Noble were our schools’ main place to get food at SLU, but to many alumni that used to be the norm. Our school’s Alumni network is large and SLU welcomes change and improvement, so it’s always great to reflect on how our school has changed over the years.
SLU also hosted a good amount of football parents who came and cheered their kids on as they played Thomas Moore, a team from Kentucky. The football game is always a popular event where parents happily show their SLU pride every year.
St. Lawrence planned multiple events for parents and students to attend and among the most popular events planned was the Mentalist show, with Mentalist and speed painter Robert Channing. Robert Channing had been previously featured on America’s Got Talent and he did nothing but impress his audience here on campus as well.
Audience members were left speechless and amazed as he guessed all items handed to him by audience members after putting coins over his eyelids, tape and a blindfold. His skills did not stop there, as he also impressed the audience with accurate recounts of personal details about their lives after he asked them to all write down their funniest memory on paper.
Parents and students alike could not stop talking about Channing’s performance over the weekend. Hay ’20 spoke about what he did over the weekend stating, “We went to the concerts which were really good,” he started. “We didn’t get to see the mentalist show but we wish we had after hearing about how great it was.”
His personal account of the events he attended were all positive, filled with excitement to have had the opportunity to spend time with his mother and disappointment that he was not able to attend all the wonderful events of SLU Parents’ Weekend.