Memories by Latasha Boyd

Hi everyone! I am excited to be back celebrating this milestone with you all. When I left MIT in 2018, I “graduated” with the first class I helped admit. It felt poetic, in a way. I embarked on a new career as a college counselor to give the same advice I loved to give on the blogs. Each of my students heard about finding their puzzle piece and the magic they will bring to any college they choose to attend. However, the more I acclimated to my new community, the louder the whispers in my head became:

“Don’t you think it’s time to leave MIT behind?”

A question I know many blog readers have also struggled with. Do you stop visiting the website at the end of your college application journey? What’s the point of sticking around?

My office still has admitted student art from CPWs past on the walls, and a picture of the quad near room 3-108 rested against a window. I predicted with my students when decisions would be released. In the time I have been away, I have still connected with the best admissions team in the world who have become some of my closest friends.

Last spring, I vocalized the whisper to my friends and was met with blank looks. My sense of sacrifice in the name of professional maturity was dismissed. It turned out I was still welcome, and the fence I had been building was unnecessary. My time at MIT was not just a phase, but a foundational thread in my journey that lead me to reflect on my impact in the world and how I love to engage and support students. Just as your time here has helped you reflect on your desires for a campus community that can feel like home as much as the blogs have. I hope that whatever your relationship with MIT has been, that we all are able to maintain our curiosity of the world, sense of adventure, and thirst for knowledge that we nurtured (and can still find) in these pages.

Now that I have seen so many more college campuses (and encourage the wisdom of a balanced college list), I share the magic of Denver sunsets, central Pennsylvania plasma labs, and arctic studies in Maine along with the magic that MIT shared with me.