To be perfectly honest I had never heard of Guilford College after high school. If you had told me then that I would one day be a Guilford Quaker, I might have in turn asked you, “What’s a Quaker?” However four years later here I am at Guilford, living the Quaker dream.I am one of the few kids who actually left my small town home of Covington, Louisiana, upon graduating. As a child, I spent many summers on vacation and going to camp in North Carolina. I chose to return to attend college at UNC-Asheville.

Upon arriving, I told myself, “Jordan you must remain focused and not party too much your first year.” Keeping true to my goals, I took a night off from partying each week. You know, for studying.

Making amazingly good grades for the amount of effort spent, I was kind of impressed with myself.

However, my parents were less impressed. And because they wrote the checks for school, I was about to be on my own. So I traded in my loafers for boots and I got to work. I started working a series of jobs that only a college student would work and began to slowly save money.

The next couple years of my life I spent in-and-out of Asheville-Buncombe -Technical Community College County Prison, a college commonly referred to by its detainees as “little Harvard on the hill,” a place where the dust and rust were as common as the air we breathe. I kept to my task though, and did my time with good behavior.

Throughout all this time I kept my feet firmly planted on the soccer field and with this I had made quite a few connections. It was actually through soccer that I had first learned of Guilford.

I remember when Bram, a Guilford soccer player I had met described the place to me in what I believe was an attempt at recruitment. Shocked, I asked, “Really? Beautiful women just run around naked like that?”

After doing further research, I realized the school was actually very well respected in the academic world. With an incredibly diverse student body of politically charged young people, Guilford was quite unique indeed.

Upon visiting the campus it honestly felt like a breath of fresh air. Magnificent trees graced the grounds where students marched with picket signs in hand, truly believing in the changes they wanted to see in the world.

But it wasn’t until I met with the men’s soccer coach that the final stone would fall into place.

I had been looking at other schools and different scholarship opportunities. He told me that none would compare with the discounted rate of becoming a CCE student. He was right and I decided to enroll.

Now the only problem I have is explaining to my native Covingtonians, “just what is a Quaker?”

To which I tell them to my best knowledge, “it means you can be naked whenever you want.