Opinion: A Look Back at My Time as a Communications Major

Dean College with Dean Hall and Grant Field. Photo Credit: Dean College

I’ll be honest: I hardly know the first thing about sports. Transferring to Dean two years ago, I was woefully unprepared for how closely related the Communications major is to Dean sports as a whole. Surrounded by athletes and fans ready to spin their passions into careers, I couldn’t help but wonder where I fit into it all. I’d always been a writer, happiest turning in radio recordings on the latest book or film. So, when I found I’d be taking a class on sports play-by-play, I was more than a little nervous. I hardly knew the difference between a strike and a swing. How was I meant to call a game?

While I never shared my peers' passion for sports, I found real value in immersing myself in the world of Dean sports. Taking the class, I thought about my love for writing and storytelling. The more I thought, the more I realized that we had more in common than I believed. I watched my classmates throw their hearts into what they did, listened as they recounted what brought them to sports—and what keeps them here now. Despite our differences in interests, we both love a good story. We want to watch the underdog succeed, and we want the good guy (our team) to win in the end. Knowing this, I found the gap between us starting to bridge. I looked at sports like a high-stakes novel. While the mechanics of the games were still rusty to me, I could talk about them in a way I understood. I recruited my sports-minded friends to help me out, and I saw firsthand how the love of sports could bring people together.

Through my time at Dean, I’ve been pushed out of my comfort zone more times than I can count. From stammering over my radio plays to holding a video camera like it might explode if I touch it the wrong way, I wondered if I would ever find my footing. The more I immersed myself at Dean, the easier it all became. Our interests might have differed, but we were connected by our love for what we did and our determination to make something great. I still

could not tell you what a line of scrimmage is, but I can tell you that the voices and minds behind Dean sports are some of the most impassioned people I’ve met, and I’ll always be grateful for the experience.