The University of Tennessee has a massive campus that’s constantly under construction with over 30,000 students enrolled each year. Although the campus is constantly being torn down and put back together there are always the same people you’re guaranteed to see around campus. Here are 10 people you’ll always run into at UTK!
The one thing you’re guaranteed to notice on day one of fall semester is the freshman frat guy walking around campus sweating in a full-on frat jacket and khakis. He’s likely to be doing something stupid, like wearing a blindfold around campus as his frat brother leads him to each class. As the semester goes on they lose the frat jacket and switch to extremely short pastel colored shorts but you’ll still always find them walking together. The only problem you’re going to find is identifying who is who with them all wearing the same thing.
Fall semester begins with rush week for sorority girls. But once they’ve chosen their sorority there is one big event still waiting to come: LIP SYNC. Mid semester marks the night every sorority girl has waited for. On this night each girl will be wearing some sparkly outfit, typically from a decade or movie, while also being covered in glitter. You would think that after it’s over they would go shower and the glitter would be gone but that’s not the case. Every day after this event you can spot a sorority girl by the glitter sparkling in her hair. It’s like this is the real initiation and once you’ve been doused in glitter it never leaves and you’re permanently marked as a sorority girl for the rest of your college career.
UT is famous for the Vols. You are guaranteed to see something about football in every direction you look on campus. Every time he wants to go to Einstein’s or Starbucks he’ll probably be seen taking pictures with fans or trying to keep his head down while some girl is snap chatting his location and once he’s been spotted he won’t be safe for the rest of the day. The football star is and always will be the treasure of the university even if he’s on a losing streak.
UT is known for their Supply Chain Program at the Haslam College of Business. The business school is home to the serious types of students. The students ready to take over the world with their new ideas and become rich CEOs. Obviously, this does not happen for everyone and most students realize that after their first year in college. However, there’s always the one that’s holding out hope that he’s going to be the next big thing. This is the guy who hands you his business card during welcome week and then hands it out to the entire class including your professor. He is also the guy always in a suit and ready to take any meeting.
Although UT is in the south and in a mostly republican state, it’s a public university just like any other. UT is open to new ideas and allows students to explore their own interests. However, there’s always going to be the guy who is not excepting of allowing the younger generation to explore these ideas. This guy is not a student, but a middle aged man. We call him the preacher, mostly because no one’s been bothered to learn his name. He’ll be seen on Ped Walkway during class change reciting from the Bible. Now that sounds fine when you think of it, a guy willing to take time out his day to spread the word of God. But this guy goes about it the wrong way. Typically, he’ll start attacking a student walking by, saying that they don’t dress appropriately. And this is where he draws a crowd of students telling him how wrong he is. Since UT is a public university no one can actually make him leave so you’ll see him from time to time.
The crane has become an honorary member of the University of Tennessee. The crane has been responsible for the continuing construction on campus for so many years and it would be wrong to not include it on this list. Everywhere you turn you will see a crane standing tall in the sky. A lot of students have even thanked the cranes over the years for their support: “I would like to thank all the cranes that have lifted me up through my 4 year journey.” The cranes are a part of campus and there’s not a UT student who would feel at home without a crane around.
The most known fact about UT has nothing to do with football or academics but with parking. It has been proven that there are fewer parking spots than there are parking passes sold to students each year. This results in the massive parking war that comes around 10am-2pm every day. Most people will just keep driving around the parking garage until they find an open spot. Others will intentionally steal a spot and almost cause a wreck trying to get it. But there’s the one student who knows how to find a spot and quick. He’ll enter the parking garage and while driving he will find an unsuspecting student walking back to her car, then he’ll roll his window down and use his southern charm and ask if she would like a ride rather than having to walk all that way and when she says yes he politely asks for her parking spot. This guy is rare. He has no fear of letting a stranger in his car because he knows the importance of that parking spot.
UT’s campus is the perfect place to exercise or go on a walk with your dog. But some students take this a little too far, not necessarily in a bad way though. Walking your dog around campus can sometimes result in bringing your pet to class. This would make you think you’re going to see a dog in class every now and then, but people get creative at UT. More times than not I’ve seen more people bring their cat to class than their dog. You’ll be in class and all of a sudden you’ll hear something meow. Or you’ll be walking on campus and you’ll see someone walking their cat on a leash. It turns out there’s actually a lot of cat people on campus.
UT has a tradition where on Friday you wear orange in support of the game taking place the next day. Some people wear orange every day. They don’t just wear an orange shirt though. They have an orange hat, orange shoes, orange shorts, orange overalls, orange scarf, orange pins on their backpack, orange backpack, and most importantly they have all orange décor in their apartment. He’s not just a football fan either. He loves basketball, baseball, swimming, tennis, and he’s even the golf team’s biggest fan. You’re guaranteed to meet this guy on day one of college and see him every day until you graduate because he’s never one to miss anything on campus, like being a part of the largest human letter.
Last but not least there’s typically a day every UT student can recall that a visitor asked them how to get somewhere on campus. The campus is constantly under construction and not even students know how to get everywhere. Apparently visitors think every student is a walking tour guide to UT and that we must know everything about our university. Since we all live by the motto “vols help vols” it’s our duty to help out our visitors. We try at least. Sometimes we don’t always know where a building is but we still try to help steer them in the right direction.
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