I’ve been a part of the Annual Fund since February 2006, when I came back from winter break my freshman year and decided that I needed a job. I applied for and got a job at the Calling Center, but it wasn’t until I came back to school for my sophomore year that I began to get the feeling that it was more than just a job. I found myself getting great satisfaction from connecting with alumni and raising support for the various programs that come out of the Annual Fund. The more I spoke on the phone the more I appreciated that a lot of these resources we were talking about simply wouldn’t exist without the support of generous Rochester alumni.

I consider myself lucky to be a recipient of the Rush Rhees Scholarship, a very generous merit based aid package that definitely influenced my decision to come to Rochester in the first place. I also know that there are very deserving students – some who I’ve known since freshman orientation, some who I’ve met at the Calling Center, and so on – who simply would not have had Rochester as a choice if it weren’t for scholarship and aid packages. It really clicked for me that the reason such good people were given the opportunity of a great education came right back to my work with the Annual Fund.

I’ve spoken to plenty of good people who simply are in a tough spot and don’t feel like they have the resources to contribute. I say it on the phones all the time, but it really is participation that makes the biggest difference in a campaign like this – not just for our statistics, but because everyone sharing whatever resources they can with students who deserve this quality education creates a wealth of opportunities that would otherwise not be available.

I’m proud of the experience I’ve had at Rochester, and I’m very proud that next year I’ll be able to identify myself as an alumnus of this University. The opportunities I’ve had at school – a great curriculum across many disciplines, unique research in my engineering courses, resources like the writing center and the career center, to name a few – have put me in an outstanding position to head out into the real world in May and be successful. I feel like I owe a debt to the future students of the University to help provide these services like so many alumni before me have done, and it goes without saying for me that I will support my alma mater to the greatest degree I’m able for the rest of my life.

Name: Kyle Adams
Hometown: Pittsford, NY
Academics: Mechanical Engineering (major), Economics (minor), Certificate in Management Studies with Finance concentration
Graduation: May 2009