Spring Break!

Posted on March 24, 2013 by Elaine

I couldn’t go home for Spring Break this year because I had rowing practice. It was great to be rowing because in the beginning of the week the weather was really nice, and I just enjoyed being out on the water! However, the best part of the break for me was being able to see my parents! I am very close to my parents and not being able to see them in nearly two months has been hard because last semester I somehow managed to see them every month. Anyway, they came to visit me at the end of spring break! We had so much fun because we got to explore Tulsa.

We went to the Gilcrease Museum, and to some of the restaurants that I had heard had amazing food, and went shopping! In case you were wondering some of the best places to eat are: McNellie’s, Mod’s, The Coffee House on Cherry Street (as I have said before), Tally’s, Elote Cafe, The Brook, and The Phoenix. Although we only went to McNellie’s and Elote Cafe while my parents were here, I would recommend all of them! There is a lot of great food in Tulsa.

The Gilcrease was really cool too because students get in free, and it is always fun to look at new exhibits. It is slightly different from the Art Museum in St. Louis (where I’m from) because the Gilcrease has more art and artifacts from the American West. I also had fun shopping at the mall, but my mom said that her favorite place to shop is still Utica Square (which is really convenient because it is so close to campus). I really enjoyed having my parents here, and I look forward to seeing them again.

Tuesday with Tulsa

Posted on March 12, 2013 by TU Community

Today’s Tuesday With Tulsa blog post comes from Gracie W., a junior German and Education major from Rogers, AR.

Before I came to TU, I never realized what a new and diverse world there was to discover just two hours from my home. International students make up a significant part of TU’s student population, and their numbers are growing each year. Yet, we often allow cultural differences to prevent us from getting to know students from other countries. But I’ve found that international students are some of the friendliest people you’ll ever meet, and they’re usually eager to make American friends. If you reach out to the international population at TU, you’ll find it’s easy to start some incredible, enriching friendships.

My first semester at Tulsa, I took a beginning Russian course. On the first day of class, I was surprised to find that I was the only girl in a class of 17 Arab men. The course focused on conversation, so I spent most of the time talking with my classmates in Russian. Through all of our fumbling with new words and a new alphabet, we got to know each other pretty well. Though I knew almost nothing about Middle Eastern culture, I never felt out of place in class. Later on, I also met several Kazakh students through the Russian Club. Who would have guessed that the Russian language would bring so many Middle Eastern students and American students together? That’s the beauty of internationalization at TU. If you just take the effort to reach out to the international community, they’ll welcome you with open arms. You’ll also find students from all over the world. As a German major, I’m always thrilled talk with exchange student from the University of Siegen. And last summer, I had a fantastic time getting to know a group of Chinese exchange students as part of my job at the Center for Global Education.

Now, I am studying abroad myself. My experiences in Germany have shown me just how much it means to find a friendly face in a new place. So my advice to any incoming students would be, don’t be afraid to reach out to the international community. As TU students, we are very lucky to have so many enriching international opportunities on campus. Make the most of them!

Tuesday with Tulsa: Mobile Moments from Scotland

Posted on March 11, 2013 by TU Community

Today’s Tuesday with Tulsa post comes to us from across the pond…Hillary S., a junior Energy Management major from Parker, Colorado, sent us these mobile moments from Scotland.

Hey y’all, I’m back for another edition of Golden Mobile Moments! I don’t normally say “y’all” often, but here everyone says “yous” and it’s really weird.

This time, I’m writing to you from Aberdeen, Scotland, where 3 other classmates and I are studying abroad for the semester. As an Energy Management student, we have the option to study abroad in Scotland or Singapore. We’ve been having a great time meeting new people, but also hanging out with each other. It’s nice to have a little TU family even when you’re far away!

These are letters from my pledge class. They wrote them to me before Christmas break and put them in a huge envelope that said, “DO NOT OPEN UNTIL THE PLANE.” It really brightened the trip over the pond. I was the only person in my house to go abroad this semester, so sometimes it’s easy to feel like I’m missing things. But they have been doing a great job of keeping me in the loop!

There is a unicorn in the middle of the city. What.

I was actually expecting it to be much colder here, but all in all, it’s very good. This was a particularly blustery walk to work one morning, but at least I got to rock my TU umbrella!

Yay, sunshine in Aberdeen!

Superbowl Sunday/Monday. It started at 11:30 pm here! Luckily, Thomas’ flat has a TV. Unluckily, there are no commercial breaks in sports here. So there were extra commentators and no funny commercials. We watched them the next day on YouTube.

People really do wear kilts here, y’all. The boys went to a formal dinner for work and said it was 50/50 tuxedos/kilts. I take a lot of creepy pictures on the bus. There could be an anthology of ONLY bus pictures.

This is right across the street from my office building. My internship is really interesting, because I didn’t really know anything about offshore drilling before coming here. The project I’m working on is a report on the transportation of offshore rigs to locations around the world.

We’re right on the North Sea, so there’s a beach, but I won’t be swimming anytime soon. Reid said that he wants to run into it, just to say that he did. There were people surfing in wetsuits, when we visited.

This river runs behind our campus. It was a nice day this week and I ate lunch out there!

I really miss TU, but there is plenty to see here. Don’t worry, we’re bringing plenty of Golden Hurricane spirit to Aberdeen!

Tuesday with Tulsa: TU Spirit

Posted on March 5, 2013 by TU Community

Today’s Tuesday With Tulsa blog post comes from Oriana A, a junior marketing major from Tulsa and member of the TU Spirit Squad.

What I love about sports is not the refs, trick plays, slam dunks or cheerleaders (even though I am on the Spirit Squad), it’s the fans. There is nothing quite as exciting as being in a huge stadium like the Reynolds Center and hearing the student section stomping and yelling for the Golden Hurricane basketball team. For being the smallest division 1 school, we make a lot of noise. We even have a new head coach, Danny Manning, who has taken our team to a new level. This past Saturday, the Spirit Squad (comprised of Pom, Cheer and Mascot) organized a flash mob for the student section to perform at halftime. Students came dressed for the occasion and breezed through Gang’em style, YMCA and the Harlem Shake as if they had been preparing for this performance all season (in reality we only had 1 practice!). The performance turned out to be just what the basketball team needed to come back from a 30 point deficit and win the game!

I have been on the Spirit Squad for 3 years and this flash mob will always be one of my favorite memories. Another favorite memory was going to (and winning!) the Liberty Bowl in Memphis on New Year’s Eve. Even cold and raining weather couldn’t keep us down! I graduate in May, 2014 and hope that my senior year brings another Liberty Bowl win as well as a Basketball CUSA Championship.

TU service day

Posted on March 4, 2013 by Elaine

Service Day was last week! This is one really cool thing about TU. There were many different places that people could go to volunteer. Basically, you signed up to volunteer for the morning. Then you got assigned a time to show up, and buses would take you to your location.

My sorority got to go to a church and paint the walls. I had rowing practice that morning, so I did my service with the rowing team. We went around campus and checked all the yellow bikes (the free TU bikes students can check out for the semester) to make sure they were still there and see if there was anything wrong with them. I had a great time with my friends doing something to help!

Snow Day and Service Day

Posted on February 28, 2013 by Mercedes

We had our first snow day but unfortunately it did not result in a snow day from school! Nevertheless the snow made campus even more beautiful than it typically is. Originally I am from New Jersey so for the majority of my life I got white winters every year, but after living in Arizona for so many years I forgot what it meant to actually have to walk in the snow on your way to class. It was definitely a nice experience though and I enjoyed watching people have snow ball fights and build snowmen. I even saw guys building a snow fort outside of the John (John Mabee is the all male dorm) and by the time my class was over i came back outside to see it was even furnished with chairs and all!

The view walking out of the Admissions building!

McFarlin Library and one of many snowmen!

Also last Saturday was service day as someone posted about earlier! I went to an elementary school and the building they are in was a junior high but it was closed for a year and the elementary school just opened. They have been slowly but surely making a ton of improvements. It was too cold on Saturday to paint since originally we were going to paint hopscotch patterns outside. Instead we created a template so when it does warm up a bit they have a good idea of where to paint. The hopscotch patterns were from the United States, Nigeria, and Great Britain. I worked on the one from Great Britain with Kerry who lives with me. Together we made this massive template:

Hopscotch Great Britain style!

I was very proud of us! After that we moved on to cleaning out a storage room and then we joined the others outside and moved lots of dirt in preparation for re-mulching and planting flowers in the spring. We even had help from some little boys that went to the school and saw us working! If volunteering is something you’re interested in TU makes it so easy to log some hours! Plus it is a great feeling knowing you are with 400 of your other classmates all doing some good and giving back to the community!

OMEA Jazz Band Performance

Posted on February 26, 2013 by Andres

Walter White and the TU Jazz Band at the OMEA 2012 Convention

I don’t like to toot my own horn, but jazz artist Walter White sure does! Walter is a TU alumni who has worked with the Big Band Jazz program on and off throughout his career. This January he visited for a second time to play the OMEA, Oklahoma Music Educators Association, convention. I’ve been in the jazz band here at TU for only one semester and getting to play with a renowned jazz artist such as Walter has been an experience I never even fathomed possible. The concert was nothing short of spectacular. A high school band and UCO’s Jazz band, which consists of student’s getting their master’s degree in jazz, played in the concert with us. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a room more electric than that concert hall was. I only played congas in one song and I felt like a superstar to say the least. Of all the musical experiences I’ve had in my life I think this one touched me the most, and I have decided to stay in jazz band here for as long as I possibly can. TU jazz for life!

Chinese Spring Festival

Posted on February 15, 2013 by David

One of the great things about TU is how culturally diverse our campus is! This past weekend the Chinese Student Association celebrated the Chinese New Year and held a Spring Festival. They had catered Chinese food (which was delicious) as well as a talent show. The acts ranged from traditional Chinese dancers to an awesome game of charades (which is always funny despite the fact that I know little to no Chinese). Overall, it was a great night making new friends and eating some amazing food!

Spicing It Up a Bit!

Posted on February 13, 2013 by Mercedes

One of the things that I feel is really great during college, but especially TU, is the fact you choose what you want to study. I’m an education major but this semester I have a huge variety of classes which are mostly mandatory to fulfill other requirements but it is spicing up the typical classes I took last semester. For example I’m taking geology which I have not studied since sixth grade so that is interesting! I’m also taking a class that is based on Wagner’s ring. I literally had no idea what that was about when I signed up for it so in case you were wondering it is about four operas which deals with a ring that was forged when a dwarf renounces love and that ring controls everything. Also, one of the goddesses was traded to the giants in return for building a fortress and that goddess happens to be the only one that can tend to the apples that keep the gods youthful and powerful. Anyway it is definitely an interesting semester with a lot of variety which is nice especially because I’ve met a ton of new people! Tulsa Time is coming up so I’m sure all of you reading will hear more about that! Hopefully we’ll see a ton of you on campus soon!

I Believe In D’Mann

Posted on February 12, 2013 by Jack

Last week, the university bussed me and a group of my fraternity brothers I to The Matilda Mossman (TU women’s head basketball coach) and Danny Manning (TU men’s head basketball coach) Radio Call-In Shows to a local restaurant. Showing our support for TU athletics is important to us. Eating dinner and talking sports with my brothers also made for a great evening. Shout out to Coach Manning who personally ordered us a cornucopia of appetizers. We’ll be sure to make it to future shows and games to show our support! #BlowCane