The ELC Mall is usually filled with various student organizations tabling for events while passersby aggressively avoid eye contact. During the week of March 6, however, the gauntlet-like stretch was taken over by a sea of orange T-shirts, indicating that the deadline for Orientation Assistant (OA) applications was fast approaching.
Cooper Price-Waterhouse ’19, an enthusiastic student who was an OA in 2016, was tasked with recruiting students to apply to what he called “the most life-changing experience a University student can have.”
Kelly Accenture ’17 attempted to avoid Price-Waterhouse and his army of other OAs on March 6 by ignoring their pointed looks and inviting body language, but she was still accosted by several orange-clad students as she walked from one end of the ELC Mall to the other while retrieving a package from Student Mail Services.
“Some kid asked me if I had applied yet to be an OA,” Accenture said. “I could barely hear him over ‘Stacy’s Mom’ blasting on their speakers, but I knew what he meant.”
Accenture, who applied to be an OA her sophomore year and was rejected, has been bitter about the program ever since.
“I told him that I’m a senior and his expression went blank. It was like he never expected someone would say anything but ‘yes, I’d love to apply!’ I DID apply! And I would’ve been the chillest OA ever,” Accenture said.
Although Accenture had glowing reviews of her experience as a first-year with OAs, Accenture said she “didn’t want to be one anyway. If someone said ‘Hey, Kelly, shake your booty,’ I would have given them the finger.”