David Green
Sophomore, global business major

I first heard of the University when I was thirteen years old. My sister was dating a guy who was in Bridgebuilders, the program for local young African-American men that the University hosts, and I got into the program and was so impressed with the University. I hadn’t even known it existed. It seemed so far away from my native southeast Portland — especially when I was a kid riding the bus to get there Monday nights for Bridgebuilders...

My college decision came down to Portland or Pepperdine, and at that point I was fascinated with engineering, and the University really helped me with financial aid, so I chose Portland, but then once I got here I got more interested in international business and entrepreneurship, so... that’s why I am studying Chinese, and Japanese history, but I am also talking a great Bible class, and next year I am taking a piano class... you wouldn’t believe all the classes you can take here. It’s a little stunning.

I’d like to work overseas after I graduate — maybe in sports somehow. My entrepreneurship project is establishing a series of basketball tournaments — the game is a common language itself, it seems to me, and I have always loved coaching it. I’m coaching now, eighth- and ninth-graders, trying to fit that into studying and classes and a job in a computer store. Things are, ah, ­stimulating as a University student, that’s the word.

What surprised me the most as a student here is perhaps the thing that sets the University apart from all others, I think — the sheer warmth and attentiveness of the people here, the communal feeling. Once you come out of your freshman shell the University opens up in amazing fashion. It’s the bonds among people here that set the place apart. I don’t know if everyone outside the Univer-sity sees that. But it’s for real. All doors are open. And all kinds of doors are open — which is, in a word, thrilling.