Hello Future Mustangs!
Welcome to Open House 2024, our 31st annual celebration of welcoming our prospective students and their supporters onto Cal Poly’s campus! Your Cal Poly journey begins today. Our names are James Jensen and McKenna Grant, and we are this year’s Open House Co-Chairs. Open House has played a massive role in our life here at Cal Poly, whether it was attending Open House as prospective Mustangs or planning Open House for the next generation of Mustangs. We hope Open House and Cal Poly can have the same impact on you!
Open House and the rest of Cal Poly Orientation has given us the tools and opportunities to succeed and thrive at Cal Poly. We have been able to put “Learn by Doing” at the forefront of all of what we do. Equally as important, this program has provided a strong community to root ourselves in, giving us courage to further grow in other places around campus. We hope that you find your home at Cal Poly throughout the Open House Weekend, whether it is in one of our hundreds of clubs, through one of our many campus resources, or in the people you meet along the way.
During your weekend at Cal Poly, we highly encourage you to seize the moments that happen throughout the weekend. You can head downtown to our Farmers’ Market, meet other students at Friday Nite Invite, see Cal Poly Talent at Dexter Stage, and so much more! You can utilize our website and The New Mustang Guide to truly make the most out of your time at Open House. We have showcased so much of Cal Poly for you during Open House we hope you can make the most of it!
Take time exploring the campus and town, go up to current students and ask them about their experiences here, and reflect on if this school is a place where you see yourself succeeding. Educationally, Cal Poly offers many resources to support each student, a unique “Learn by Doing” pedagogy in the classroom (which may not be a typical 4-walled space) that is rare to find across other universities, and professors who are excited to personally teach their material and connect with students further through many research opportunities.
Many of you reading this might be wondering — how do I decide if Cal Poly is the right fit for me?! While you will each come to a conclusion of your own, here are a few things that helped us realize this campus would become home for the next few years:
- The people – when touring different college campuses, this school stood out because students here are engaged, walking around with their heads up on the lookout to say hello to friends between classes.
- High activity — there is always something happening in the SLO area that students are eager to explore, maintaining a healthy work/school/life balance.
- The location — the beautiful mountains, oceans full of wildlife, and the town of San Luis Obispo itself is a perfect pocket on the Central Coast to adventure, create friendships, and build community that will help you grow throughout your college career.
Finally, we would like to express our deepest thanks to the 2024 Open House Leads and Committee, who are the body of student leader that have been working tirelessly to plan and execute the 31st annual Open House. The Open House Committee are the twenty-three dedicated student leaders who started planning for this Weekend in October of 2023. Each Committee member enthusiastically took on their own event or project which they had full control to make their own. We would also like to thank the entire campus community and our campus partners for their dedication to welcoming our new members to the Mustang Family! At this Open House, we hope that you get to interact with all these folks and come to love Cal Poly as much as we do.
Go Mustangs!
McKenna Grant, Open House Co-Chair Fifth Year Biology, Class of 2024
James Jensen, Open House Co-Chair Third Year History, Class of 2025
