CSUN Freshmen Present Projects at Annual Celebration

  • More than 1,100 people showed up for the 10th annual Freshman Celebration. Photo by Ruth Saravia.

  • Students gather around the award-winning project done by professor Tina Bertacchi-Love's class. Photo by Ruth Saravia.

  • Two students show off their project during the 2015 Freshman Celebration. Photo by Ruth Saravia.

  • One student's project included sleeping under a table. Photo by Ruth Saravia.

  • A student looks over a project that was submitted for the Freshman Celebration. Photo by Ruth Saravia.

Freshman students enrolled in University 100 at California State University, Northridge expressed their creativity by showcasing their projects during the 10th annual Freshman Celebration on Nov. 23–24 at Northridge Center in the University Student Union. Many of the projects were created in response to the 2015 Freshman Common Reading, Every Day by David Levithan.

Out of 38 classes that displayed projects at the celebration, professor Tina Bertacchi-Love’s students won the People’s Choice Award for their project, “Walking a Day in Our Shoes.” Each student placed a pair of shoes — to represent invented characters’s “external selves” — on a table with a note, symbolizing that each individual is much more than what others might see.

Professor Heidi Schumacher’s class won the On-Site Project Award for “Grit Expectations,” a project in which students showed how they overcame mistakes made throughout the year.

The Virtual Celebration Award, which touched on same-sex marriage and binge eating, went to professor Lisa Riccomini’s class for three short videos created with the goal of raising awareness and urging change.

For more information on the Freshman Celebration, visit the program’s website.

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