Chapters

0:00 Welcome to Who Are You?
0:30 Who is Colin Fanning? 
0:41 How Quinnipiac came onto Colin’s radar
2:05 Visiting through the “Bobcat for a Day” program
3:15 Why he chose business & management
3:50 Colin’s first day at QU
4:55 Making friends and getting involved
9:10 The impact of New Student Orientation
10:54 Tips for student success
11:58 Rapid-fire Q&A!
13:54 What he wishes he’d known before coming to QU
14:16 One thing every first-year should pack
15:15 One thing people worry about but shouldn’t
16:19 Advice for students starting their college journey

Transcript

Joel Vanner: Welcome to ”Who Are You?,” the Bobcats, you know, the stories you don't. I'm your host, Joel Vanner, inside the podcast studio at Quinnipiac University's School of Communications. And I am joined today by my guest, Colin Fanning. Colin, welcome to the show, and nice T-shirt.  

Colin Fanning: Thank you. Good to see we're matching. 

Joel Vanner: Got the memo. The only guest so far that reads my memos. Anyways, I'm sure you could guess by the name of the show what my first question to you is going to be. And that is, who are you? 

Colin Fanning: I am Colin. I am a senior 3+1 applied Business major from Hunua Falls, New York. 

Joel Vanner: So, Colin, tell me how Quinnipiac came into the picture for you. 

Colin Fanning: Yeah, so kind of an unconventional story. I was actually sitting on stage during fall of my senior year. I was in a play. My high school always does a play in the fall, and the scene we were rehearsing wasn't pertaining to me, so I was just kind of sit off to the side, scrolling through a list of colleges. 

Joel Vanner: As one does in their senior year? 

Colin Fanning: Yes, always good to scroll around, look and see what the next new big one is. And I thought to myself, Q is an odd letter. There can't be that many schools that start with a letter Q, so I scrolled all the way down to the Q, and there were three or four. But only one really caught my eye. It was this school. I didn't even know how to pronounce it at the time, but it turns out it was Quinnipiac. 

Joel Vanner: Neither did ESPN, by the way, when we. When our men's hockey team was having their successful seasons. 

Colin Fanning: Yes. But I clicked on the link, started exploring the website, didn't immediately, you know, find anything, but then I found the school business page. I knew I wanted to be a business major and found the School of Business 3+1 program, and kind of the rest is history, came for an academic visit, came for just a general tour visit, open houses, admitted students day. And here I am 2.5 years later. 

Joel Vanner: Was your academic visit in the "Be a Bobcat for a day" program? 

Colin Fanning: It was. I came for "Be a Bobcat for a day." Spring of my senior year, I did a couple at other schools, and I thought, I might as well do one at Quinnipiac. I got paired with somebody from my academic program, the Applied Business Program, and she was, like, really helpful in framing the 3+1 program and helping me understand how it's not that much different from a traditional college program and how, you know, she has tons of friends, including herself that have been really successful in it. 

Joel Vanner: I actually did the "Be a Bobcat for a day program", too, and that's what solidified my want to come here to Quinnipiac. It's great to be able to shadow a current student around, attend some classes. Sometimes they're the ones that your host student is in. Sometimes they let you attend some other classes, and then they often show you around the residence hall or take you to lunch or something cool like that. 

Colin Fanning: Yeah, she lived in Ledges. So she brought me into Ledges, showed me around, showed me the community areas, and gave me a really good understanding of what it would be like during my first year as a Bobcat. 

Joel Vanner: Where did your love for management and business come from? Was there a moment growing up that you had that you said, This is what I want to study or is it something that you kind of found while you were looking for colleges? 

Colin Fanning: Yeah. Both my parents, they have worked in business their entire lives. So I kind of grew up around that sphere. But then, while I was in high school, actually, I got, like, a little mini internship at the company that my mother worked at, doing some behind-the-scenes HR work, and that kind of just really solidified. I knew I wanted to go into business, but then that mini internship itself while I was still in high school, like, solidified business, and then finding a 3+1 MBA program. Sent me here. 

Joel Vanner: So your first day at Quinnipiac, it was a fresh start for you, right?  

Colin Fanning: Yes. 

Joel Vanner: You didn't know anybody, didn't have a car. 

Colin Fanning: Yep. 

Joel Vanner: Tell me a little bit about coming to a place that you don't really know anybody or anything about yet. 

Colin Fanning: Yeah, it was a bit intimidating at first. You know, I'm from 6 hours away. Like you said, didn't have a car my first year; first-years can't have cars. But I managed to find my home pretty quickly here at Quinnipiac. I like to think I was pretty lucky that I found a group of people that I had very common interests with very early on. Um, and my transition while, you know, emotional. I missed my parents back home, missed my brother back home. It was it was refreshing to, you know, restart here at Quinnipiac, make a brand new set of amazing friends, pretty early on. 

Joel Vanner: So you met your friends, and you found your community, so early on in your experience here at Quinnipiac, how did you do that? 

Colin Fanning: Yeah. So one of the easiest ways that it comes to all first-year students is the fall engagement fair. It happens during the first week of classes every fall semester. All the clubs and organizations that this university offers, I think we're up to around 170 at this point. They all get a table booth out on the quad, goes on for two or 3 hours, and you just get to go up and meet all these wonderful org leaders and learn about what their clubs do, when their first meetings are. For me, I found a couple. The first was the Student Government Association. I had been kind of involved in student government throughout my time in high school, but then, going up to the student government table, hearing about what they do for students on campus.  

Joel Vanner: The impact they have here. 

Colin Fanning: Yeah. The bridge between the students and the administration at the university and making sure that whether it's a big issue or a small issue, it's coming to the attention of university administrators, right? So I found that group of friends through running for student government. But then I also found the University's pep band at the Engagement fair, as well. They play at all the men's basketball and hockey games and women's hockey games and basketball games, as well. And those are some of the best friends I've ever made. I'm actually roommates with one of them right now that I met during my first year in the pep band. He plays the trumpet. We lived together last year, and now we're living together again. 

Joel Vanner: At least you can share common practice times, right? Living in the same residence hall. 

Colin Fanning: Yeah, our roommates down the hall, maybe not so much, but, you know, we learned those scores pretty quickly. But yeah, it was just really good to come to campus in the fall, go to that engagement fair and find a group of people who had common interests as me because I wasn't necessarily sure how to make friends, but the easiest way that it came to me was finding people with those common interests and bonding over those and then expanding those friendships to what I have today. 

Joel Vanner: And then, connecting to your interest in business, you are also the operations manager for our Carl Hansen Student Center, which is where a lot of these involvements come together. What do you do as an operations manager? 

Colin Fanning: Yeah, so in the Carl Hansen Student Center, I serve as the operations manager. So I oversee the Carl Hansen Student Center Information booth, and then the welcome desk to our campus life office suite on the second floor. That is home to all of the professional staff members that oversee the multitude of areas of engagement that the university offers. So our Office of Student Engagement, our Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life, and our Office of Community Engagement is all housed up there. And I oversee the student employees that actually run the spaces on a day-to-day basis. 

Joel Vanner: A lot of great experience, the same place you're learning, getting to use those human resource management techniques that you're learning in class in your on-campus job here. And you have another role, too, orientation. You're an orientation leader.  

Colin Fanning: Yep. 

Joel Vanner: And you have a connection with your orientation leader who brought you into the program, right? 

Colin Fanning: Yeah. So throughout my first year, I wasn't necessarily dead set on becoming an orientation leader, but I got an email around the end of my first semester saying you have been nominated by your OL, orientation leader, to actually apply to become an orientation leader yourself. And I kind of felt that as, like, a call. I wasn't necessarily planning on it, but then as soon as somebody was like, I think you're good enough to do this, um, you should do it. And I'm so glad that I applied. I've had the time of my life, these past two summers serving as an orientation leader. Shout out to all my first-years this current summer in my crew, Stagecoach OL group, and my partner, Katerina. We've had such a fun time during orientation and really made an impact on the first-years that come through. 

Joel Vanner: And it's great you had that encouragement to look at becoming an orientation leader. There are some administrative things that happen during orientation that all first year students go through. But if you could summarize the impact of orientation here at Quinnipiac, how would you summarize it? 

Colin Fanning: Yeah, orientation, probably the most important time of your whole experience at Quinnipiac, it's the start of your foundation at the university. If you, you know, kind of just go through the process, don't really take part in all the icebreakers that we do, pay attention to the different group meetings, you're going to kind of start off your time at Quinnipiac on the wrong foot. And so really going through orientation with an open mind sets you up for success for your first year and your four years, five years, six years, seven years. However many years you're here at Quinnipiac, orientation really is that jumping off point to a successful Bobcat career. 

Joel Vanner: And there's a whole lot that must be going I was a first year; you were a first year. There's a whole lot going around our heads at that time, too. So to have a structured program like orientation, that definitely helps orient you to Quinnipiac and the new community that you're joining. 

Colin Fanning: Yes, we as much as the first years despise the time we spend in Burt Kahn, those presentations that we sit through really are the most vital points of information that will set you up to be a successful Bobcat, learn about all the different, you know, resources to keep you happy and healthy and safe and to keep you academically, you know, on the point, basically. 

Joel Vanner: So in the School of Business, on the first day of classes, you share a common theme with another guest we had on our podcast, where you personally introduce yourself to all of your faculty members. Expanding on that, are there any other tips and tricks, things you've learned during your time here at Quinnipiac and your student involvements that have just given you the confidence to succeed and helped you develop in your aspirations to be a business professional? 

Colin Fanning: Yeah. I think the number one thing I could tell any Quinnipiac student is to go out and make those connections very early on. As you said, I was, I like to think pretty smart and went out and made those connections on the first day of class because those connections can mean the difference between when your professors get, you know, an internship opportunity handed to them from a previous employer and, you know, you're the first person on the list or you're the second person on the list. Those connections really make the difference in whether you get that opportunity first. 

Joel Vanner: Colin, as an orientation leader, you are a pinnacle of light and knowledge for students and their families when they join our community. So I have some rapid-fire questions for you, ready?  

Colin Fanning: Ok. 

Joel Vanner: Alright. Let's see what you say. What is your go-to place to eat on campus? 

Colin Fanning: Breakfast and Co., By and far, the best place on the Mount Carmel Dining Hall. It's open all day. Breakfast, you can get a bacon, egg, and cheese on white bread with a hash brown. Absolutely amazing. 

Joel Vanner: Delicious. Order on your phone, too, so you don't have to wait in line. Go to a place to eat off campus. 

Colin Fanning: Got to be ixtapa. It's a Mexican restaurant with quesadillas, tacos, and burritos. 

Joel Vanner: Classic establishment. 

Colin Fanning: Amazing. Yeah. 

Joel Vanner: What is your favorite weekend activity? 

Colin Fanning: It's split between the student programming Board events. They host events every Friday and Saturday night, bingo events, trivias. They give out amazing prizes. They have food-themed events. I think they had a chicken nugget night and a mac and cheese night last semester. 

Joel Vanner: And especially at the beginning of the terms, they have a whole ton of events, especially to welcome you to campus. 

Colin Fanning: Yes. Or the men's and women's hockey games on the weekends. Those are also really fun. Really show the Bobcat pride and spirit. 

Joel Vanner: What's the best event on campus? 

Colin Fanning: It's got to be Wake the Giant. It's every spring up in the M&T Bank arena, with relatively cheap concert tickets. This past year, we had Quevo come. He was amazing to see. And again, relatively cheap concert tickets at a college. 

Joel Vanner: Pretty good experience. I had Khalid when I was here. That's my favorite Wake the Giant, but I would agree with that answer. What is one thing you wish you knew before coming to Quinnipac? 

Colin Fanning: Probably just don't doubt your decision to choose Quinnipiac. You know, you chose Quinnipiac for a reason. Quinnipiac chose to admit you for a reason. During your first weekend here on campus, you might be missing, you know, your parents back home, might be missing friends, but just remember that you are really here for a reason. 

Joel Vanner: Get involved. And there are so many different ways you can invent yourself and try new things and explore things here. And if there's not an organization at the engagement fair, you can also create your own, too. That's a really good opportunity. Yeah. This is something you're probably asked a lot. What is one thing a first-year student should bring when they move in? 

Colin Fanning: I've got two that they have to bring.  

Joel Vanner: One thing, I'll let you say two.  

Colin Fanning: Okay. Two things you have to bring. First one is some sort of, like, comfy bed roll to put on top of the mattress.  

Joel Vanner: Mattress pad. 

Colin Fanning: Mattress pad. Yep. The mattresses in the dorm rooms, they're okay. But, you know, if you really want to get comfortable, get a good night's sleep, so you're ready for class in the morning, definitely bring a bedroll. Second, bring something from home that reminds you of home. Homesickness happens to everybody. It's something that every college student goes through. And I forgot something from home to, like, really remind me of home. And so definitely bring something that will remind you of home. If you ever experience homesickness. 

Joel Vanner: Bring that blanket or that stuffed animal, that little trinket on your desk.  

Colin Fanning: Yes. 

Joel Vanner: Plenty of space to put it somewhere. What is one thing that everybody worries about, but they don't need to when you're coming to college? 

Colin Fanning: I would say making friends right off the bat. Everybody makes friends at their own pace. I came to Quinnipiac kind of with this misconception, gave myself a quota that I have to have, you know, six best friends by the end of the first day after move-in.  

Joel Vanner: That's hard, that's like a Bingo card.  

Colin Fanning: I know. It's unrealistic. You know, you make friends, you meet people at different rates, and getting involved definitely helps, but you never want to put yourself in a situation where, you know, you're racing to meet people and trying to force those friendships. Because Friendships really have to be natural. 

Joel Vanner: It's also day one of three, four, five, seven, eight years, and your sophomore year could look totally different from your freshman year.  

Colin Fanning: Exactly. 

Joel Vanner: And those things could come then, too. 

Colin Fanning: Yeah. 

Joel Vanner: So those were the rapid questions. But to close, maybe the hardest question. What advice would you have to students who are maybe a little bit nervous about starting their college journey or who may not know exactly what they want to study in college yet? 

Colin Fanning: Take time. You know, as you said earlier, you have four, five, six, seven, eight years here at Quinnipiac. And it really all does take time. You don't have to have everything figured out the second you finish unpacking your dorm room this fall. You know, you really do have time to figure out what your passions are, figure out where you want to spend the rest of your life, what you want to do the rest of your life, and really just don't rust the process. 

Joel Vanner: And all that can change, too. 

Colin Fanning: Yeah. 

Joel Vanner: It's all about what you learn here and how you use it and the experiences you have.  

Colin Fanning: Yes. 

Joel Vanner: Colin, thank you so much for taking time today and sharing your insights on the show. I appreciate it. 

Colin Fanning: Thank you. 

Joel Vanner: If you enjoyed today's episode of ”Who Are You?,” be sure to find other episodes on Apple, Spotify, and YouTube podcasts, and be sure to like and subscribe. Until next time, when I ask my next guest, who are you? I'm Joel Vanner. Bye for now.