Frosh? The University of Toronto was founded in 1827. That means there are almost 700,000 alumni living all over the planet. One of those 700K was Professor of Economics Dwayne Benjamin. Here is what he remembers about being a new student.  

For those of us who work in an academic institution, September feels like a new year more than the one that January ushers in: our rhythms are driven by the academic calendar. With September comes a quickening of pace, within and around us: Students return to campus in full force and calendars fill up as we prepare ourselves for the more regularly scheduled programming of the school year. As we fall back into this familiar tempo, there is the (largely optimistic) sense that September is a fresh start, a feeling that is helped along by the crisp air that arrives once summer starts to give way to fall.

While this is my 35th year as a faculty member at U of T, the fall memory that resonates most with me is my first year as an undergraduate at Victoria College, living in North House of Burwash Hall (in 1980!).

It was exciting to move to the “big city” after finishing high school in relatively sleepy Ottawa. As was convention in a men’s residence, my stereo was my prize possession. Not unlike male songbirds, we broadcasted our musical affinities as a matter of personal branding and differentiation. That fall, my turntable wore out London Calling (The Clash), I Just Can’t Stop It (The English Beat), Quadrophenia Soundtrack (The Who), and even Bad Habits (The Monks). Looking back 43 years from then, it’s shocking to imagine that the comparable playlist for my 1980 self would be from 1937 (Benny Goodman and Duke Ellington).

I also remember that my first real interactions with the University of Toronto were not with faculty, but with staff in the Vic Registrar’s office: Helping me enroll in courses, sort out how to pay my fees, arranging OSAP (including taking on loans for the first time), ensuring my scholarship was in order, and more generally offering a port should a storm arise. Not only was there no internet, photocopies were a luxury, and all of the paperwork was completed on carbon paper to generate duplicates. Except for a bank, it was my first real experience with independent “adult” transactions, and the quality of support I received from people with these mysterious new titles (e.g., registrar, bursar) helped welcome me to the community and provided a foundation that allowed me to focus on my courses (e.g., ECO100 in the Medical Sciences Auditorium with 499 other bewildered students – a course that materially changed my path in life).

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