The Luminary celebrates 10-year anniversary
On Aug. 22, first-year Utah State University students took part in the 10th annual Luminary, a symbolic occasion that welcomes incoming Aggies.
The tradition includes first-year students walking from the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum to the Quad holding small paper lanterns designed to look like Old Main’s iconic Block A. The students’s lanterns glow white, and along their path to the Quad stand alumni, friends and family holding their own lanterns that glow blue.
The path they take is significant because it is the opposite route during their commencement ceremony for graduation. Many kinds of new Aggies were in attendance, including transfer and international students. However, the most prominent group were those who took the USU Connections course before returning students began their own classes.
Connections is a course designed to help students transfer to college life and take advantage of the university’s many opportunities. According to usu.edu, 74% of first-year students take the course, and 91% of them find it beneficial.
Logan’s campus is not the only one to participate, as Aggies from across the state participated at the same time. The other campuses who upheld the tradition were in Price, Tooele and Blanding.
Three of these incoming students who participated were Katelyn Crouch, Katelynn Cunninghan and Alexis Whiten. Both Crouch and Cunninghan are transfer students from Snow College in Ephraim, while Whiten is a first-year student from Payson. Crouch and Cunningham met at Snow and met Whiten during their time in Connections.
“I love school, so it’s fun to be in a new place for sure,” Crouch said. “I had never really heard of the Luminary before, so I’m excited to see what it is. This is a way bigger school than Snow College.”
The three participated in the Luminary together, having remained connected to old friends and making new ones through Connections.
The event opened with speaker Sierra Graul, assistant director for student success and student orientation and transition services, welcoming the incoming class of 2029. She led students to turn on their lanterns together, and as the overhead lights dimmed in the Spectrum, it was illuminated instead by a sea of new Aggies.
The program was then passed over to Harrison Kleiner, associate vice provost for general education and an associate professor of philosophy.
“I’m really honored to be part of one of your first experiences as an Aggie,” Kleiner said. “I’ve heard so many wonderful stories about these Connections classes, and looking out at this crowd, there’s a lot of really bright futures here in the Spectrum tonight.”
In their Connections groups, many led by peer mentors, the lantern-wielding students made their way to the Quad as the sun began to set behind the valley’s Wellsville Mountains. As they were cheered on by their community, they filed onto the Quad in the shape of an A while a drone above took a picture of the white lights held up by the class of 2029. The light on Old Main turned blue, welcoming the newest members of the Aggie family.
“This is your moment. You’re going to be golden,” Kleiner said. “This commencement tonight will end in four years at your graduation commencement, and that will be a public, viable sign of being transformed. On that day, when Utah State becomes your alma mater, we will celebrate your growth as an educated person.”