{"id":2886,"date":"2020-09-14T11:55:23","date_gmt":"2020-09-14T15:55:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/?p=2886"},"modified":"2020-09-14T11:59:23","modified_gmt":"2020-09-14T15:59:23","slug":"freshman-takes-the-win-in-virtual-talent-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/2020\/09\/freshman-takes-the-win-in-virtual-talent-competition\/","title":{"rendered":"Freshman Takes the Win in Virtual Talent Competition"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Hunter College freshman Andie Carroll won \u201cHunter\u2019s Got New Talent,\u201d a virtual competition exclusively for freshmen and transfer students.<\/p>\n<p>As part of the line-up of welcome week activities for new students, the virtual talent show accepted submissions solely from freshmen and transfer students. This was a break from tradition, according to the event\u2019s host, Hunter\u2019s Undergraduate Student Government.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe wanted to try something virtually and decided let\u2019s focus on them,\u201d said Hardik Bhaskar, USG president.<\/p>\n<p>Although Carroll wishes to pursue nursing professionally, she has been singing her whole life and been playing guitar for the last six years. For this competition, Carroll performed an unnamed song by Philadelphia musician Lizzy McAlpine.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think it\u2019s pretty cool,\u201d said Carroll, who won 122 of the 251 votes. The New Paltz resident also added that despite not always being self-assured in her abilities, this competition bolstered her self-esteem.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s definitely a boost of confidence,\u201d the 18-year-old said.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Andie Carroll&#039;s singing submission to &quot;Hunter&#039;s Got New Talent&quot; competition\" width=\"610\" height=\"343\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/S2a8xgU85MI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Every year from 2015 to 2019, Hunter College enrolled between 2,200 and 2,600 new freshmen as well as 2,000 new transfer students into its undergraduate-degree seeking student population. As custom, Hunter\u2019s USG hosts in-person events to help freshmen and transfer students get familiar with their new school as well as build relationships with each other and existing students.<\/p>\n<p>But this year, USG had to do this competition and other welcome week activities online because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Bhaskar says that the transition is challenging.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s been tough doing social events that are not really social,\u201d said Bhaskar, who added that USG would usually host events where they would share food and interact with hundreds of students. He also said that students currently do show interest in USG\u2019s virtual events, but miss them because they are overwhelmed with schoolwork and other virtual events that are happening at the same time.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a bit weird because our numbers have dropped significantly,\u201d he said in reference to student turnout for other virtual events USG has had.<\/p>\n<p>Students submitted their talent pieces between August 26 and September 1. Although USG welcomed anything that could be considered a talent, students only submitted videos of themselves singing, playing instruments or drawing. From the submissions, USG chose three finalists and announced them on September 4 via an Instagram post. From there all Hunter students could cast a single vote by either commenting under the Instagram post or directly messaging the USG\u2019s Instagram page. Voting ended on September 6 at 12 p.m. The USG announced Carroll as the winner on Tuesday at 1 p.m.<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/CEuPWvRHgDL\/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link<\/p>\n<p>The other two finalists were Vasila Abdumuminova (drawing) and Paul Carano (flute). Abdumuminova drew a picture of Korean actor Woo Do Hwan, in a scene from a Korean drama. She said that she was happy with the competition.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI did feel welcomed because the student government was nice about the whole thing,\u201d said Abdumuminova, who is an illustrator for Dear Asian Youth, an organization dedicated to uplifting Asian Youth.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Vasila Abdumuminova&#039;s drawing submission to &quot;Hunter&#039;s Got New Talent&quot; competition\" width=\"610\" height=\"458\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/wJbyWiicV_Q?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Along with this competition, the USG hosted Saturday Night Hangouts on August 29 and September 5 at 6 p.m. as part of welcome week. All students were invited.<\/p>\n<p>Currently, the USG is planning study nights, a club fair, trivia competitions, student discussion forums, and other virtual events to keep students engaged. Although it is difficult, Bhaskar says that he wants to build a sense of community and be a support system for all students.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s been tough but we\u2019ll see how it goes,\u201d he said. \u201cI just want to be there for students even during the pandemic.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The USG plans to host another \u201cHunter\u2019s Got Talent\u201d in the spring. It is unclear whether this will be a virtual, in-person, or hybrid competition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Amid the challenge of virtually welcoming new students to Hunter, the school\u2019s USG hosts a virtual talent competition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":2889,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,26,325,1,324],"tags":[303,279,313,55,56,184,73,13,116,38,284,39,45,40,44],"class_list":["post-2886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-featured-column","category-multimedia","category-news","category-student-life","tag-covid19","tag-huntercollege-hunterstudents","tag-virtual","tag-art","tag-arts","tag-cuny-hunter-college","tag-events","tag-hunter","tag-hunter-news","tag-music","tag-pandemic","tag-performance","tag-student-government","tag-students","tag-usg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/71"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2886"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2886\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3298,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2886\/revisions\/3298"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}