Meet the Class of 2030

Somehow, 2030 has gone from sounding like the year one plans to reopen a time capsule to appearing on college diplomas just four years from now.

For the 560 first-year students beginning their Salve Regina University story this fall, a lot can happen between now and then. Student Government Association President Simar Jagpal '27 has one piece of advice for them: Don't worry too much about what that story is supposed to look like right now.

"You don't have to know who you're going to become yet," Jagpal told the Class of 2030 during her remarks at this year's Convocation.  

It is fitting advice for a class arriving at Salve from 31 states and countries across five continents, each student bringing a different path to Newport – and now getting four years to figure out where that path leads next.

Near, far and everywhere in between

For some members of the Class of 2030, getting to Salve required little more than a short drive.

First-year student Aiden Barry lives just about two miles from campus. Transfer student Tyler Minick, one of over 40 new transfer students joining the University this fall, comes from about six miles away.

Others had a considerably longer move-in day. Lara Horeczko traveled 3,092 miles from Walnut Creek, California, and Uma Apo Tsang made a journey of roughly 3,450 miles from Spain and is originally from Argentina.

They are part of a new class stretching well beyond the Ocean State. Salve's incoming students represent 31 states, while 13 new international students hail from nine countries: Argentina, Bermuda, Brazil, Cameroon, Canada, France, Japan, Ghana and Sweden.

Different hometowns, different cultures and different experiences – and, as Jagpal reminded them, plenty of stories that haven't been written yet.

"Some of the most meaningful parts of your college experience will be the things you never planned for," she said.

Maybe that means discovering an unexpected academic interest, joining an organization on a whim or meeting a lifelong friend in a residence hall. Maybe it means arriving from thousands of miles away and eventually considering Newport home.

Three years ago, Jagpal was the first-year student sitting beneath the Convocation tent as a member of the Class of 2027. She knew neither the people who would become some of her closest friends nor the experiences that would challenge her. She certainly didn't know she would return to that same tent three years later as a senior, finance major and SGA president welcoming the next generation of Seahawks.

"You arrive with an idea of who you are, and over the next four years, Salve gives you the opportunity to discover who you can become," she said.

Some Salve stories start long before move-in

For 18 incoming students, joining the Salve community is also something of a family tradition: They have at least one parent who graduated from the University.

Then there is Christopher Glass, whose connection to the Class of 2030 comes with a distinction no other first-year student can claim: He was the very first member of the class to commit to Salve. Since then, 559 other first-year students have joined him.

Those 560 students arrive at a particularly interesting point in time. The Class of 2030 has grown up in an era defined by rapid change. Many were born around the time the first iPhone was introduced. Netflix was still primarily mailing DVDs. Instagram and TikTok did not exist. "Streaming" had not yet become shorthand for how an entire generation watches television.

They have since lived through the rise of smartphones and social media, remote learning during a global pandemic, viral TikTok sounds, Spotify Wrapped, artificial intelligence moving into everyday life and more internet trends than anyone could reasonably be expected to explain.

College, Jagpal told them, will now bring its own collection of moments.

"There will be conversations in residence halls that seem completely ordinary at the time, but years later you'll remember exactly who you were with and what you were talking about," she said. "There will be dining hall meals, walks across campus, games, traditions, final exam nights, celebrations, mistakes and moments that don't seem particularly important until you look back and realize they were."

The road to 2030 starts now

There is something extra neat about being part of the Class of 2030. Their graduation year doubles as the beginning of a new decade – a milestone that still feels distant enough to sound futuristic.

Jagpal warned them that it won't feel distant for long.

"Don't spend your four years waiting for the next one," she said. "Don't spend freshman year wishing you were a sophomore. Don't spend sophomore year wishing you were a junior. Don't spend junior year wishing you were a senior. Because I can tell you now, from the other side, that it goes incredibly fast."

Instead, she challenged the newest Seahawks to say yes a little more often: Go to the event they almost skipped. Introduce themselves to someone new. Talk to a professor after class. Join the club. Run for the position. Sit with someone who is alone.

Those choices, Jagpal said, are part of how Salve's community continues to take shape.

"You are not simply joining our community, you are becoming part of its story," she said. "There will be traditions here that existed long before you arrived, and there will be traditions that begin with you."

By spring 2030, the numbers used to introduce this class will tell only a small part of its journey. For now, though, they are at the beginning.

"You don't know your story yet," Jagpal told them. "And that's okay. Because here and now is when you get to write it."