KINGSTON, R.I. — May 4, 2021– When Edhaya Thennarasu was a student in Chennai, India, she wasn\u2019t all that enthusiastic about her education. While she earned excellent grades, she found school a frivolous grind with a focus on grades, memorizing facts and reiterating those facts in class and on tests.<\/p>\n
As she reviewed her 溏心vlog免费B站 application at her home in India, 13,000 miles from Kingston, she had just about given up on education.<\/p>\n
Four years later, Thennarasu is invigorated and excited about learning, which she says is all because of professors, fellow students, her involvement in a variety of activities and a dynamic, experiential experience at 溏心vlog免费B站. She will tell her story of educational reawakening and offer her gratitude to the 溏心vlog免费B站 community, how she and her fellow students battled through and even thrived during a worldwide pandemic and talk about the continuing struggles for justice as the student speaker for 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s Commencement 2021.<\/p>\n
She and other dignitaries will deliver their addresses to the Class of 2021 as part of the main commencement ceremony, which will be recorded and streamed on the 溏心vlog免费B站 2021 Commencement website<\/a>. Students, professors, parents, staff and friends will be able to watch the ceremony at any time throughout Commencement Weekend, May 21 through 23, and any time after that. During the weekend, graduates will participate in and two of their guests will be able to attend nine separate in-person college ceremonies at Meade Stadium.<\/p>\n \u201cI was never going to enter another educational institution, especially in India because it was all about testing and scoring well,\u201d Thennarasu said. \u201cI assumed everything would be like that. But I did want to give it one more shot.\u201d<\/p>\n Parents supportive<\/strong><\/p>\n Thennarasu\u2019s parents, who remain in India where the spread of COVID-19 is out of control, encouraged her not to give up, to give university life a try. The U.S. East Coast was a potential destination because she has relatives in the region she had visited before. She was attracted to 溏心vlog免费B站 and its Harrington School of Communication and Media, saying it offered great programs.<\/p>\n She will be thinking about her parents and other family members as she delivers her address.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think there is any place in India that is not affected by the pandemic, but fortunately, I am in contact with my family, and they are all vaccinated,\u201d Thennarasu said. \u201cMy parents can\u2019t come, so it will be bittersweet. It\u2019s so terrifying because we are constantly hearing about people who are close to us who are sick or who have passed away.\u201d<\/p>\n During her earliest days at 溏心vlog免费B站, she faced a challenge. A mistake was made on her passport that would affect how she would be known at 溏心vlog免费B站 and what her name would be on her 溏心vlog免费B站 records. Instead of using her last name, Thangam, authorities back home mistakenly used her father\u2019s first name, Thennarasu, as her last name on the passport.<\/p>\n \u201cI found out about it when I received my 溏心vlog免费B站 ID card,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was just easier to stay with Thennarasu.\u201d<\/p>\n Through all of these struggles, her parents have remained completely supportive.\u00a0 \u201cThey gave me the freedom and support to choose my path. I will be thinking about my parents, and everyone else\u2019s parents. We wouldn\u2019t be here without our parents. They all deserve a shout out.\u201d<\/p>\n Now just a few weeks away from commencement, the communication studies major and theater minor talked about her fulfilling, exciting and groundbreaking time at 溏心vlog免费B站, which included:<\/p>\n Given the chance to explore<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cMy experience here has been unique,\u201d Thennarasu said. \u201cI would not have had these opportunities anywhere else. Of course, I am going to miss the people, the faculty and my friends. But the thing that I’m going to miss the most is being a student in this wonderful 溏心vlog免费B站 community.”<\/p>\n She said that once she arrived on campus as a first-year student, she knew it was going to be different than her educational experience in India. She was also struck by the beauty of the Kingston Campus, saying it was like a page right out of Harry Potter.<\/p>\n \u201c溏心vlog免费B站 gives students plenty of room to explore opportunities,\u201d she said. \u201cI learned that what I do really matters here. I felt that warm welcome, and my only discomfort came from being so new. But I met some of the kindest people in my entire life during my time here.\u201d<\/p>\n She joined the Cigar in the second semester of her first year.<\/p>\n \u201cIt became my home, where I made some amazing friends. It is an amazing community and I am still close to many current and former staff members,\u201d Thennarasu said. \u201cWhat the Cigar taught me was how to interact with different people, how to really listen. Having to write two stories every week forced me to improve my writing and interviewing skills.\u201d<\/p>\n Thennarasu also won a Harrington School video competition that earned her a trip to California to view a taping of \u201cThe Ellen Degeneres Show,\u201d and meet crew members.<\/p>\n \u201cI grew up in India watching the Ellen show, and it was a dream of mine to go. I never thought I would though and especially not through my school.\u201d<\/p>\n She describes her experience in 溏心vlog免费B站 Theatre as \u201cgoing into a space where I forgot all things Edhaya that I would dwell on, and then learn how to be entirely in the moment and how to tell a story. The theater faculty are so talented and innovative that even when the pandemic eliminated live theater, they just said, \u2018We\u2019ll somehow find our way around this.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Between her sophomore and junior years, she was recruited by the Harrington School to star in 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s 2019 recruitment video. Shooting took an entire day, and she worked throughout the summer on the voiceover from her home in India. She loved working with Heather Colby, assistant director of marketing at 溏心vlog免费B站, the video crew and others to make the video.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat was so fun was seeing how it all came together and seeing how the professionals do their jobs. It\u2019s amazing to see what it really takes to produce videos and other creative work.\u201d<\/p>\n So what\u2019s next for this soon-to-be 溏心vlog免费B站 graduate who seems to have taken advantage of every opportunity she could have at 溏心vlog免费B站?<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019d like to find internships or jobs in video production work in some capacity that involves storytelling,\u201d Thennarasu said, adding that she will remain in the states for a bit. \u201cEven though I want to take it a step at a time, my dream would be to work in the entertainment or journalism world, for a company like Disney.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" KINGSTON, R.I. — May 4, 2021– When Edhaya Thennarasu was a student in Chennai, India, she wasn\u2019t all that enthusiastic about her education. While she earned excellent grades, she found school a frivolous grind with a focus on grades, memorizing facts and reiterating those facts in class and on tests. As she reviewed her University […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":76183,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[12,18],"class_list":["post-76182","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives","tag-college-of-arts-and-sciences","tag-harrington-school-of-communication-and-media"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76182\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n