Hey guys!
Another reminder as to who I am, my name is Pooja Alloju and I’m now currently a THIRD year at SCO from Dallas. That’s crazy how fast time has passed! So, you guys know how I found myself here and a few things I like to do in my free time, but I wanted to write about SCO- specifically the staff here.
One of my favorite things about SCO is how this school does a great job of making everyone feel welcome and part of the SCO family, and this feeling extends past professors and even Dr. Reich (our president). I specifically wanted to highlight two staff members specifically, Ms. Melissa from our on-campus eatery, Blink, and Kevyn from Physical Plant.
I’ve mentioned Ms. Melissa before and her amazing food (meatballs and bread pudding), but one of my favorite things she makes is a chocolate cake with whipped topping and heath bar. It’s something she doesn’t make often but one day in passing I told her that that was my favorite dessert. Two days later I was eating my lunch and Ms. Melissa came up to me and gave me a free slice of her cake and said, “I hope you have room for dessert.” I was genuinely touched that someone that really doesn’t interact with me on a daily basis wanted to make my favorite dessert and give me one for free. Anytime she has that cake, she always makes a point to let me know! And y’all I’m not joking at how great this cake is!
I needed to let everyone on snap know how great this cake was!
So, over the summer I actually moved! I used to live on Mud Island but for my last year at SCO I decided to move Downtown into a studio apartment. And with the new move I actually needed a couch, and since I have a handy dandy boyfriend – I asked him to make me a couch. YES, I said make!. My new couch actually required crib mattresses for the cushions. I bought my couch cushions (aka crib mattresses) from Walmart online and because I wasn’t thinking I had them sent to my school mailbox. Well, when they came in – I was in clinic and had maybe 20 minutes to somehow carry TWO of them to my car that was parked at the Activity Center. As I was lugging these things around (I know they’re crib mattresses, but they were kind of heavy), Kevyn from Physical Plant saw me struggling with them. Now I knew Kevyn from before this because any time he’s around he’d always greet us as we entered school. He saw me struggling and asked if I need any help. Not only did he help with carrying these mattresses throughout the school, he also walked them out to my car! He even asked me the next time he saw me how the couch turned out!
Here’s a picture of that “couch”, I also made the ottoman!
I’ve realized at SCO that these are not just random acts of kindness – this is just how kind everyone here is! I think I’ve always ended these posts with something along the lines of how SCO does a great job of making you feel welcome when you join, and I hope now y’all can believe me!