Colgate University’s 2024 First-Generation Celebration Week marks the bridging of communities across campus.
Junior Etiosa Ojefua, a First@Colgate student and Office of Undergraduate Studies scholar, has found his home on campus through various organizations and opportunities. He has previously served as the club liaison of the Black Student Union, where he coordinated events with other clubs.
Through his involvement with the Office of Sustainability, Ojefua has also been able to pursue his interest in sustainability. He even shared his excitement for a sustainability related event which took place on Nov. 2 during First-Gen Celebration Week.
“The one [event] that I’m really interested in is [Rooted in Service: Growing Community], and I think this is the first time that First@Colgate is doing something with the community garden, so I think that’s something really exciting, especially for people who are into nature and plants,” Ojefua said.
Ojefua is an international student from Nigeria, but he has also lived in Newark, N.J. before attending Colgate. He described how, in high school, he did not have a sense of community where others shared his experience as both an international and first-generation student.
“I remember being in high school here, and I never really got a sense of community where I could meet other people who aren’t necessarily American or had parents who went to school here,” Ojefua said. “Everyone was already pretty acclimated to the system, and I thought it was going to be the same here at Colgate.”
Upon arriving at Colgate as a first-year, Ojefua did not know what to expect in terms of finding a community where he felt comfortable and supported.
“I came in here with not really having that hope of finding that community because of high school,” Ojefua said.
His experiences through First@Colgate proved his initial hesitation wrong.
“First@Colgate showed me that there is a community, and it wasn’t just me now as the immigrant or other person whose parents didn’t go to college or high school in America,” Ojefua said.
Ojefua remains grateful for all of the support and opportunities that First@Colgate has provided him in his transition to college.
“Although it was hard to transition, First@Colgate existing as an entity in of itself made that transition way easier,” Ojefua said.
As a junior, Ojefua has noticed the differences between this year’s First-Gen Celebration Week compared to those in his previous years at Colgate. He has generally seen improvement in the week’s festivities with simply how robust and how many events there are. Ojefua commented on his role in the week as a first-gen student.
“Although I’m not a program assistant, I do help with brainstorming when I can,” Ojefua said.
Aside from the week in particular, he explained how events for first-gen students through First@Colgate have been plentiful. Ojefua also underscored the importance of staying involved with First@Colgate events as a junior. He noted how it takes more of an effort to attend events based on location.
“I don’t go to as much as I should [while] living down the hill. That transition from sophomore to junior year has really impacted me, but last year I went to a lot of them,” Ojefua said.
Despite this particular obstacle to attending events, Ojefua emphasized a greater one, which concerns the divide he has noticed on campus regarding whom students believe that events are made for.
“I think it’s not a major divide where you can see it happen explicitly, but I think implicitly people […] feel as though they will make others uncomfortable by their presence,” Ojefua said. “I feel like some are not wanting to be in a space that they’re not part of, and I think that that’s a really big misconception that people should get away from.”
Ojefua further elaborated, believing that Colgate students are cautious, causing them to not go to events they would otherwise attend.
“I think it’s because we’re nice to a point where we don’t want to intrude on space, and I think that’s where the divide lies,” Ojefua said.
In his excitement for First-Gen Celebration Week, Ojefua is hopeful that students will go to events regardless of the implicit barrier they sense in attending them.
“Hopefully we get to a point on campus where people don’t feel the need to check themselves before going to events and they can just go freely,” Ojefua.
While he does not know how to limit this divide’s hold on students, he believes that the advertisement of events helps, especially when clubs and organizations collaborate to host events. From his perspective, collaboration can bridge communities that would otherwise not converge.
“A big thing about First-Gen week is that it’s not just about first-generation students, but it’s also about celebrating connections we make when non-first-generation students go to First@Colgate events,” Ojefua said.
