By Jaylon Brunson

Dear GC, goodbye. When I got to Greensboro College as a first-year student, I thought I had everything figured out. I was here to play baseball, stay in my lane, work hard and get my degree. I pictured long practices, quiet weekends and just grinding my way through school. I did not come in expecting to become someone different. I just thought college would be … college.

Baseball was my main focus from day one. Early lifts, long practices in the sun, traveling for games. That felt like the identity I came here to carry. I learned accountability, not just showing up, but showing up ready. Baseball also taught me how to deal with failure quickly. One mistake can erase a whole week of progress, and you have to shake it off. Discipline, patience and learning how to keep going, those lessons stuck with me.

But even early on, I started feeling myself pulled toward something else. In my first year, I switched my major from Exercise Science to English and Communication. This was not a plan I had thought of; I was not thinking about poetry or journalism when I first got here. But professors noticed my writing before I did. They pushed me to explore it, they challenged me. And suddenly, writing became a way for me to express things I never slowed down long enough to think about.

That did not mean baseball was not important anymore. It just wasn’t the whole story. I kept playing through my sophomore year and into the fall of junior year. And when baseball eventually ended, it did not feel like a loss. It felt like the campus saying, “Okay, now here’s the rest of who you are.” I finally had space to grow in other directions.

That is when I really started getting involved. I became a Dialogue Ambassador, helping lead conversations about race, identity and social issues that matter. I did not expect to be someone guiding discussions like that, but it fit. It felt natural to listen, to learn and to help other students open up. I was not just joining something, I was contributing to the culture of the school.

The thing about Greensboro College is that it brings you up in ways you do not see coming. It’s calm here but motivating at the same time. It’s a place where you can think, try new things and be heard. It is not just professors or classmates who make that feeling, it is everybody. The custodians who say good morning, the ground crew who take pride in how the campus looks, the staff members who remember your name even if they met you once. GC does not feel like a big loud campus, but it feels like a connected one. It is a community that pays attention.

I am leaving with more than a degree. I am leaving with direction, creativity, confidence and a voice I did not realize I had freshman year when I walked in thinking I was just an athlete. I found out that I am a writer. I am a leader. I am someone who can step into a room and help people talk through the things that matter.