Be Good. Be Orange.

Be Proud. Be Orange. By: Matthew Guzman

“What does it mean for you to be Orange?” That is the question most people ask students and alumni from Oregon State University. Many people respond with different answers such as: “We’re known for our sports programs”, “Our engineering program is one of the best on the West coast”, or even “The community is so large, yet close with one another”. Whatever people think about the Orange community, we think about it in a positive way that is mostly true because whatever one thinks, most people of the same community think the same way. Being in a community means that people grow with one another and when the opportunity arises, they will not hesitate to help those that are in need. The academics aspect are true, we do have one of the best university engineering courses in the PAC 12. Including the many academic clubs that continue to excel, there are many social and athletic clubs that bring people closer together through sister and brother hood that form bonds into the working environment. But being Orange, first and foremost, to other students that attend Oregon State would be that we’re a school that takes school pride seriously; an example is that we wear and represent our school colors proudly. Being proud about our school is one of the reasons why people like our school. A lot of peers from different schools wear our shirts even though they go to schools like UW, USC, or UCLA. Something else about school pride is that when people ask “what college do you go to?”, tell them “Oregon State”, and if they respond ‘the ducks’, we will always proudly say, “No we’re beavers, get it right”. When coming from a small island community such as Hawaii, it’s safe to say that people bond when you know someone else is from the same place. You mostly have the same values and interest, therefore you feel comfortable with them. Oregon State is the same way, when someone says that they are from Oregon State, most people will always feel comfortable in a stressful environment.

Currently, being Orange as I have explained it is the best example of how I want it to be. Being proud about where a person comes from is great for confidence in making other choices that translate to the real world. Making key choices that affect your life positively can make one more ambitious, which is what employers look for when interviewing potential candidates for positions. I want Orange to mean that everyone part of our community is accepting of others that aren’t apart it, to also instill the positive values that we have learned to them so that we can let them feel what we feel. If students of Oregon State don’t feel the close bonds of being classmates, lab partners, roommates, athletes etc., after graduating, then I don’t think that the institution hasn’t done its job. It hasn’t made one come in contact of others that can potentially help guide people through college and make it a more enjoyable experience. What I want Orange to be is that to get the best education that I can possibly get, in order to fulfill on of my goals of getting a job for a successful career in a field that I want to go into. When people fulfill their duties when graduating, I want them to continue acting how they would if they were still at Oregon State.

The phrase “Be Orange” can be spread how anybody sees fit in a positive way that it should be. Even if it’s just helping someone with a small task, that person is representing Oregon State University, because if that person happens to be in the work environment and asks where you’re from, you’ll impact the school’s reputation in a positive way. Being proud is setting the tone for any activities that you undertake, whether it is a personal project or an altering decision that affects other individuals. It creates a positive mental attitude that other people can feed off of and therefore create a team that can accomplish difficult feats. When creating this team, one inadvertently creates an environment of a community, which comes back to the first and foremost value of my definition of “Be Orange”. There is a purpose about how people act in a community, they provide for it and reap the benefits of those actions when presented.