Letter to the Class of 2029

Dear Minerva Class of 2029,

Welcome home!

Right now, you might be packing your bags, hugging your loved ones goodbye, or daydreaming about what your life will look like in San Francisco. Maybe you’re excited, maybe you’re terrified, or maybe you’re somewhere in between – floating in a haze of uncertainty, dreams, and exhaustion. It’s okay. That’s exactly where you’re supposed to be.

Let me tell you something about San Francisco – not the touristy postcard version with cable cars, painted ladies, and Karl the fog hugging the Golden Gate. I want to tell you about your San Francisco. The one you’ll meet at 2 am in the Turk kitchen, losing track of time while you have a deep conversation with your dorm room neighbors. The San Francisco that will greet you on hectic mornings, while the whole building runs to make it to their 9 am class. The one that will challenge you to see the world as it is – raw, complicated, beautiful.

You’ll learn quickly that San Francisco is full of contradictions. It’s a place of wealth and struggle, of innovation and human vulnerability, of ambition and quiet solitude. And in the middle of all of this, you’ll find yourself. You’ll walk through the Tenderloin and realize that the world is not just textbooks and theory – it’s real people, real lives, and real stories.

Maybe, like I did, you’ll cry yourself to sleep on your first week, overwhelmed by the noise and the pace and the pressure to belong. Or maybe you’ll feel more alive than ever on a spontaneous trip to Twin Peaks, the city lights stretching out below, sharing laughs in the wind and warm Bob’s donuts with the people who are starting to feel like family. Either way, I promise – you’re not alone.

Minerva gives you the world, but it also gives you the people who will help you carry it. In San Francisco, you’ll find friendships that feel like home, professors who’ll challenge you to think deeper, and a city that becomes your mirror, your campus, your sanctuary, and your storm. And every time you walk up one of those steep hills to Cali street, lungs burning and legs aching, it will remind you: you’re getting stronger.

‍

Rooting for you, 

Alexia 

Class of 2027