Two weeks ago, I returned to Ithaca to see both familiar and fresh faces on campus. I was so excited to reunite with my freshman year friends and create new friendships. As one of the original fourteen students from the class of 2022 cohort, I was especially eager to meet the newly admitted students to the program, who will be joining me on Roosevelt Island during the summers of 2020 and 2021. In the class of 2022 cohort, nine more students were admitted. Thirteen students were accepted into the class of 2023 cohort, rounding out the total number of Milstein students to 36 this fall.
I mingled with the other students at the Welcome BBQ at the Nevin Center Summer House on the night of Wednesday, August 28th and was introduced to some important faculty members who I will be working closely with in the future. Tapan Parikh, Associate Professor at Cornell Tech and in the Information Science Department at Cornell, will serve as the Milstein Program Director at Cornell Tech and is currently developing the curriculum for the summer program. I was able to introduce myself to him, as well as all the others in the program. Additionally, we chatted with Amy Villerajo, Sarah Krepps, and Jeremy Braddock, however, I did not really get a chance to delve deeper than surface level conversations with my peers in the program until this past Sunday, when we all visited Hoffman Ropes Challenge Course and participated in team-building activities.
Through various challenges and team building activities, I worked with the other students in the program to come up with solutions to overcome abstract tasks. In the first activity, we were divided into three groups; the members of each group stood in a circle of rope and were told to imagine that we were on an igloo. The task was to retrieve an item approximately 50 feet away, while all the teammates were connected in some way and at least one member of the group had to remain in the circle. In order to overcome this challenge, in my group, we devised a plan to tie all our jackets together to use as a link between the members in the circle and the members running out to retrieve the item. We then had to improvise to increase the speed at which the task could be completed. These tasks encouraged us to use our communication and teambuilding skills in a positive environment, also allowing us to get to know each other better.
The challenge was then changed and we improvised new solutions as a team. As we worked to solve the challenges, I observed a change in attitude and energy once the effort became collaborative rather than competitive between groups. The most successful ideas were not the ideas of one person, but of the entire team. Jasper Weed, a member of the original 2022 cohort, commented, “At first, like guys and girls at a middle school dance, the new and old cohorts were awkward and nervous around each other, but after conquering imaginary trolls and arctic storms, we were working together in a symphony of efficiency and camaraderie.” With these challenges, we began to form a deeper sense of trust and understanding that we will bring to our future work together.
After lunch, we were split into two groups and headed into the woods for more activities on the Hoffman Ropes Challenge Course. One of the tasks was to walk across a thin wire connected by three trees, and to make things even more difficult, some of the team members were blindfolded. The members who were blindfolded had to trust their fellow teammates to guide them safely across and help them balance on the wires. I decided to take the challenge and wear the blindfold; I had to rely on my fellow teammates to guide me as I lacked a sense that I typically take for granted. While it was frustrating not being able to see, I was able to complete the task by allowing others to guide me and trusting them.
In order to complete these tasks, we had to brainstorm ideas together as a team. Peter Munn ‘22 said, “With a goal to walk our blindfolded team members across galvanized steel wires that could splinter at any second, a planning circle emerged as a first line of attack and taught us a thing or two about gathering everyone’s thoughts before taking on a challenge.” The purpose of these activities was to practice collaboration and employ teamwork strategies. These skills will become crucial for the Milstein students to have as they spend their summers on Roosevelt Island, taking classes and working on projects together.
