East grad excels at Syracuse
By David Esteppe
On June 1, Syracuse University (SU) launched Fresh U, an online publication spirited into production by SU junior Kate Beckman. As a freshman, Beckman founded Juiced Magazine, SU’s only publication written by freshman for freshman. “I developed Fresh U to give incoming freshman the opportunity to write, edit and produce a publication that would focus on the topics most important to students in their first year of college,” says Beckman.
2014 Greenbrier East High School graduate Sara Swann has just finished her freshman year at SU and will spend the summer as Fresh Us inaugural editorial director. Swann says, “This is possibly the first publication of its kind. The online publication is for freshmen and by freshmen. Our first issue has 95 different articles in it.”
Swann spent her freshman year writing for the SU independent student-run The Daily Orange, becoming its assistant news editor. She will continue in that capacity this fall.
Fresh Us contributing writers cover a variety of topics including being rejected by one’s college of dreams; what one will or will not miss about high school; and how to avoid the `’freshman 15” (it is common for freshman to gain around 15 pounds of weight during their first year of their new college lives), and finally how to enjoy one’s first summer after an arduous first year of university study.
Fresh U has more than 130 contributing writers from about 50 colleges and universities across the country. It is projected that Northwestern University, Boston University, University of Southern California, Howard University, University of Missouri, Indiana University and the University of Pittsburgh will establish their own chapters at their respective universities in late August.
