my first year
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5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/05/25/sunday-review/srw25collegeKids.html 1/11
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Exposures
My First YearTwo Semesters in New York
5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/05/25/sunday-review/srw25collegeKids.html 4/11
IN SEPTEMBER, we asked twelve students from colleges across New York to have their picture taken. It was the first
week of school. They were all freshmen, all new to the city. They each discussed something that was important to
them — a stuffed animal, a passport, a hairstyle, a piece of writing. In April, they returned to the studio and talked
about how the year had changed them. An acoustic guitar was replaced by an electric one. A tattoo was acquired.
The stuffed animal did not return.
PHOTOGRAPHS BY CHAD BATKA FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
INTERVIEWS BY ALICIA DeSANTIS
SEPT. 6, 2013
APRIL 25, 2014
Ololade OguntayoAge 22, Los Angeles
5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/05/25/sunday-review/srw25collegeKids.html 5/11
Photography, Fashion Institute of Technology
I ACTUALLY CUT OFF MY DREADLOCKS THREE WEEKS AGO, so a lot of people who know me are doing
double takes right now. I had them four years, so I kind of like that shock value. I’m thinking about
doing a faux-hawk. Shave my sides, something crazy like that. Maybe add some colors. Have fun
while I’m young because I don’t want to be stuck with one hairstyle forever, you know?
But I mean, I do want dreadlocks again — definitely. I say they were my pride. And when I do have
them again, I want to stick with them. It’ll be like a commitment.
SEPT. 7, 2013
APRIL 26, 2014
5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
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Emily MorrisonAge 19, Jacksonville, Fla.
Painting, Pratt Institute
I GOT A TATTOO THIS YEAR. This is the number of miles from Jacksonville to
Brooklyn, from my house to Pratt. I got it before Thanksgiving break, I think. So I
was here two, three months. I wanted a tattoo for a really long time. I love them, and
I really wanted to get something that showed how far I’ve come and this huge
transition that I’ve made. And I thought that the number of miles was really
significant because I remember, before I even came to Pratt, looking up exactly how
far it was, which is 948 miles. And that seemed really cool to me. I feel like that’s a
really long way for someone to go — especially a 19-year-old.
APRIL 26, 2014
5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
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SEPT. 6, 2013
APRIL 25, 2014
Sophia GreeneAge 19, Charleston, S.C.
Fashion merchandising, Fashion Institute of Technology
EVERYONE IN MY HIGH SCHOOL KNEW ME. I dress crazy. I have a forehead piercing. I was the weird
girl. I was worried about not standing out when I came here. And then the first day, I flew in with
my mom, and we dropped our stuff in the hotel room, and we went to get lunch, and within 15
minutes of us sitting down, this man was like, “Can I take a picture of you?” He was like, “I love your
style.” It’s never happened to me in Charleston.
SEPT. 7, 2013
APRIL 26, 2014
Carter ShelterAge 18, Byfield, Mass.
Music business, N.Y.U.
I ’VE ALWAYS STRUGGLED WITH A SENSE OF WANDERLUST. The most recent song that I’ve written
deals with that, kind of never being entirely happy with the physical place that I’m in. I think that,
coming to New York I was like, wow, this is going to be the perfect place, I’ll never want to leave
here. And right now I love being here, but I know that at some point I’ll want to go somewhere else.
The first line of the song is, “I’ve been running down a north-south highway, trying to make my way
out west.” That kind of sums the whole thing up. I’d love to live in Seattle or Portland. In my head,
5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
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they’re destinations. Part of it’s the music scene, but part of it’s just the fact that I haven’t been
there.
SEPT. 6, 2013
APRIL 25, 2014
Matt KellyAge 19, Jupiter, Fla.
Film and television production, N.Y.U.
Eden BachAge 18, Brea, Calif.
Dance, N.Y.U.
MATT: AS SOON AS I SAW HER I LIKED HER. I met her the first week of school, but we started dating
in November. So it’s been going on six months. We’re very happy together.
EDEN: Our first date was the Empire State Building. He comes up with the best dates. On Easter, we
went to Central Park and went row-boating.
MATT: We went ice-skating at Rockefeller Center. We’ve gone to Coney Island, in the pouring rain
and freezing cold. I’m pretty good at trying to come up with really cool date ideas and then they fail.
When we were new to New York I was like, let’s just get on the subway and get off at a random stop
and explore an area. And so we just get off the subway, and we have no idea where we are — I still
don’t know where it was.
EDEN: And we just got right back on the subway.
SEPT. 6, 2013
APRIL 25, 2014
Sam KrovocheckAge 19, Milford, Mass.
Writing, Pratt Institute
I ’VE BEEN READING “A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES.” It’s really funny. I’d never heard of it before,
you know? Before it was usually just Russian writers that I was reading: Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor
Dostoyevsky and that stuff.
This year I feel like I’ve been learning, but I haven’t been doing much. I haven’t been really working
on my own writing much. It’s just been what I’ve been handing in to class — academic stuff. But next
year I want to work more on my own writing, maybe submitting it somewhere or starting
something. Maybe my own literary magazine. Start distributing my own ’zine. That’ll be my
motivation — start a project.
5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
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SEPT. 7, 2013
APRIL 25, 2014
Alessandro MoghrabiAge 18, Paris (past five years), via Italy
International relations and comparative literature, N.Y.U.
I FEEL LIKE I ’M ALWAYS REACHING FOR MY WALLET. I mean it’s obvious, but since coming to New
York, I just realize how everything I want to do needs money. Coffee. Everything. If I want to have a
good dinner with friends, I have to draw up a $30 tab for a nice plate, a glass of wine.
I wanted to be an actor, go into the arts as a career, but after this year, I realize that I like the way I
live. I had this really huge argument with my parents once about how you can’t just study economics
in college because you’d be selling yourself. But now I’m actually considering going into business. I’m
much more practical — I think I see better how the world works.
SEPT. 7, 2013
APRIL 25, 2014
Andriana SkalkosAge 18, Athens, Greece
Early childhood and special education, N.Y.U.
I ’VE GOTTEN A LOT OF INSPIRATION, JUST FROM PEOPLE ON THE STREET. I saw one girl — she had
perfectly straight hair, and one half of her head was blond, and the other half was completely black.
It’s nothing I could ever pull off. I know that for sure. But if I was in Greece, I wouldn’t have the
opportunity to see those audacious things, the things that you never think you can do, really. Who
said you could dye half your hair blond and half of it black? No one. This person in New York just
decided, yeah, you could do it.
SEPT. 7, 2013
APRIL 26, 2014
Grace KimAge 19, Seoul, South Korea
Nutrition, N.Y.U.
IT WAS NEW. EVERYTHING WAS NEW. Like in Korea, I would never sit down on the bus because it’s a
culture that puts a lot of emphasis on respecting your elders. So when an older man offered his seat
to me, I was like, wait, am I supposed to take this?
5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
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Kate MagnusonAge 19, Laguna Beach, Calif.
SEPT. 7, 2013
So there are a lot of little cultural differences. But at the same time you can also see a lot of
similarities — everyone’s always on their smartphone in both places. It’s weird because you don’t
know how much a place is part of your identity until you leave it.
SEPT. 7, 2013
APRIL 25, 2014
Teddy FinkelsteinAge 19, Louisville, Ky.
Financial Economics, Columbia University
WHEN YOU’RE WITH YOUR FAMILY 100 PERCENT OF THE TIME, it’s easy to see past them, but when
you take a step back and you go to college, and you don’t see your mom for a couple of months, you
miss them a little bit more than you’d expect.
I have friends at state schools who went there for the fraternities and that sort of stuff, and that was
never the route I expected to take. But I met a lot of the fraternity brothers here, and it was
different than I imagined. It’s not a big party organization. There are only 11 in my class, and to
know that everyone cares the same way that I do, to have that support, has been very clutch.
SEPT. 7, 2013
APRIL 25, 2014
Madisen MasogAge 19, Lebanon, Ore.
Fashion design, Pratt Institute
YOU CAN SEE HOW MUCH I ’VE GROWN IN MY SKETCHES. Just from drawing over and over again. Or
just from being immersed in the culture. I went to the Brooklyn Museum, to the Jean Paul Gaultier
exhibit, and it was amazing. I went back three different times. He uses recycled material, making it
beautiful. For my final project I actually made a whole top out of cardboard. I used duct tape as my
base and wove it together to make a bustier. You can wear it. It laces up in the back.
SEPT. 7, 2013
APRIL 26, 2014
5/25/2014 My First Year - NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/05/25/sunday-review/srw25collegeKids.html 11/11
Psychology, Barnard College
IT WAS A LOT HARDER AT THE BEGINNING OF THE YEAR. I was really homesick. I
missed my bed, and I missed really weird things that you wouldn’t expect, like the
smell of my house.
But I feel like it’s hard for anybody, anywhere you go. First year of college, you’re
away from your family and you’re going to change and it’s going to be scary. You’re
doing your own laundry. What you put in your body is what you choose to eat. It’s all
up to you now.
It’s freaky at first — that’s the truth. And I feel like for every person it takes a
different amount of time. And now my room at school feels more like my home.
Chad Batka is a portrait photographer based in New York City. Alicia DeSantis is a graphics editor at The New York Times. Additional reporting help by Al Baker and Nick
Corasaniti.
© 2014 The New York Times Company
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