Antonia DiLuca's Interview

“Beyond the Bubble”

 “Beyond the Bubble” is a very complex topic. Goucher College is a very small college with about 1,481 undergraduates. It is a gorgeous campus that consists of 287 acres, which is surrounded by green and woods. One of the reasons why it is called “The Goucher Bubble” is because Goucher is its own community, which is surrounded by a wall of trees. One would never see the outside world unless they walked to the very edge of the campus. A way to picture “The Goucher Bubble” in a different way, imagine Goucher College inside a snow globe. The look into this idea of “The Goucher Bubble” a little further, I had to interview someone who had a lot of experience with Goucher.

I interviewed someone who I have become very close with since I first started attending Goucher. She is a female, 21 years old and lives in the T. I thought it would be interesting to interview her because she is a college athlete, a senior and has already had her study abroad experience. I was very interested in what I found because she has many interesting and different outlooks on Goucher and I like seeing these aspects of Goucher looked at in a light. Some of the ideas that we talked about were feeling trapped within Goucher’s campus, study abroad experiences, discovering Goucher and much more.

Do you ever feel enclosed when being at Goucher? I started out the interview by asking her if she ever feels enclosed when she is at Goucher. We talked about the reasons why people may feel enclosed. There are days or even weeks where an average student will not leave Goucher’s campus. One of my conclusions is that when living at Goucher, it is very convenient for an average student to have a car with them on campus. Even though Goucher is in the middle of Towson, it is a lot easier to adventure around. Without having a car, there are sometimes very limited options. Because woods surround Goucher, people forget that they are in the middle of Towson and that there are so many options around them. Even though there is a huge city right outside of Goucher, sometimes people may forget because it is off of a main road and feels very secluded.

What is student interaction, if any, with other colleges and students in the surrounding area? The interaction between other colleges and other students is very interesting. Unless you play a sport or have friends that go to those colleges nearby, there are many cases where there are no student interactions other than with the students who go to Goucher. The college town shuttle does do a great job with trying to connect all of the students around the area. The reason why students may want to try to and use the college town shuttle, even if they do not know students at other colleges is the fact that it is very convenient and free.

How does the cultural term: “The Goucher Bubble” affect campus life? What does it tell us about Goucher? How do people break out of the bubble? My interviewee had many great answers to this question, “I really think playing a different sport or just doing some activity rather than just going to school helps because during field hockey for away games, we would leave sometimes Friday nights or early Saturday mornings and get out of Goucher. We would go to different schools, different states or just different counties in general. Sometimes just going to Pasta Mista is nice because you are out of this area. My sister goes to McDaniel and sometimes I like to go visit her for the day just to get out of here and experience something new. Even just taking a walk or going to the Towson mall is nice because you are around people you don’t see all the time and Goucher is so small that you see everyone. You may not know them all, but you see them all the time. So going to an area where you see new faces is nice and healthy I think. ” These ideas are really insightful because when I think about breaking out of the bubble, I think about adventuring into Baltimore, a little farther away from Goucher. When my interviewee talked about breaking free of the bubble, she said mentioned that even stepping over the line of where Goucher College ends and the city begins counts because you are seeing the outside world. You do not need to go far because as long as you are seeing and experiencing something new, you are breaking out of the bubble.

How do people discover Goucher? I have noticed myself that people come to Goucher from all over the area and I always think to myself, “Why Goucher?”. One of the conclusions that I came to during my interview is that many people come here for sports. They were recruited by a coach here, which makes it seem like a very good option because you know that a coach/team wants you to be here. When looking on www.goucher.edu under the “Why Goucher?” page, some of their answers include: knowing their students by name, the vibrant city of Baltimore, takes community seriously, engaged, getting out into the world (including the study abroad experience). I believe that depending on who you ask, these are the common answers that an average Goucher student will say, but depending on what they are interested, the extra curricular activities or interests are will have a big say.

How has the Study Abroad requirement affected you? We next talked about study abroad at Goucher. For study abroad, usually students pick where they want to go based on their majors. Some majors are more structured than others, so they will not have as much wiggle room to choose where they want to go. For the structured courses such as the sciences, psychology or education, those will only have a few options where students can study abroad because they need to make sure that they are getting all of their requirements in to complete their intended major. “Study abroad was a very unique opportunity. It wasn’t just going for 3 weeks, going to class with everyone you know from Goucher and your professors from Goucher and getting drunk on the weekends. I was teaching 5^th and 6^th graders English and Math concepts for 3 weeks and I was just pretending I was a teacher for 3 weeks and it was awesome. On the weekends we had opportunities to go to different safari trips, we swam in the Indian Ocean, we saw all these wild life animals, and things like that. I am really glad I went. I would definitely want to go back.” The study abroad experience is a huge aspect to why Goucher is so great. I truly believe that it changes students for the better. It makes them more independent and more mature because they have to learn how to live in an entirely new culture mostly all by themselves.

How much do you and your friends get out into Towson, Baltimore? When I asked the question: How much do you and your friends get out into Towson, Baltimore, it was an interesting answer. Because all of her friends are 21, she usually likes to go to the bars around Goucher or even downtown. I thought that was really interesting because I know that a student who is under 21 would have a completely different answer. She also talked about how it is much easier when it is warmer to go exploring around Baltimore and seeing the different things it has to offer. When it is cold, it is a different story. Usually many people like to stay inside to stay warm and don’t like to adventure out into the cold weather. Goucher also has really great opportunities that help kids to get off campus. Goucher also advertises New York trips as well as many other trips and activities around Baltimore.

What does the “Goucher Bubble” mean to you? Lastly, I asked her: What does the “Goucher Bubble” mean to you? “A close-knit community that supports one another. I went to the same school for 12 years and my mom went there before so as a first grader she was like, ‘I went there so my daughter will be fine’.  Over the years since she was there, it became really snobby and stuck up and that type of personality, which I cannot stand but I mean I was surrounded by it for 12 years so I thought that that was the normal way to live. Coming here, complete opposite! I find it really hard to trust random people but, they are more trustworthy people, more genuine people, more supportive people, more people that aren’t just going to talk about getting drunk on the weekends. They are actually talking about politics and worldly news, and things like that so I feel like I’m surrounded by something so awesome. But I don’t feel like the world runs like that at all. So that’s also another reason why I don’t want to graduate at all because Goucher just feels so welcoming, and I am so confortable in this environment that I am really afraid what the future is going to be like because I know that it is not like this at all. I know that it depends on who you hang out with in the future and everything like that and how you are in relation to your family and what not, but its really hard to find a good group of people as Goucher has. So the “Goucher Bubble”, I just feel like it’s something so unique; I don’t think you can really find it anywhere else. I don’t think that this “Goucher Bubble” exists anywhere else.”

This interview was extremely successful because I got to see Goucher in different perspectives. To some students, “The Goucher Bubble” is negative and for others such as my interviewee, it is extremely positive. The reason why people may pick a college like Goucher is because they want to feel as though they are at home. For me, I am extremely close to my family and my relatives. When I am at home, I see them almost every single day. Going to college made me really nervous because I was not used to ever being away from my family. Going to Goucher, I felt like I am at my second home. Everyone is always so friendly. If I am upset one day, I can always count on a stranger telling me to smile or asking how my day is. Like my interviewee said, “I don’t think that this ‘Goucher Bubble’ exists anywhere else.”