Best memories of the class of 2025-2026

The last few weeks of the 2026 spring semester are right around the corner, and students are eager for summer break and a reprieve from schoolwork. The 2025-2026 school year has been an eventful year, so I asked a couple of students what their favorite memories at UPG have been so far. For freshmen, these are new memories still fresh in their minds, but for seniors, the memories might be harder to pinpoint. 

Seniors Marisa Lee (left), I.T. major, and Zoe Elston (right), business management major, recall their favorite memories of their four years at Pitt-Greensburg. 

LEE: The shooting star, that’s a fun one. Our freshman year during orientation, The Big Bang, we were walking to meet our friends, and we saw a shooting star, and that was the day we started to become close friends.

ELSTON: That was a fun time.

LEE: Yeah. So that was four years ago.

LEE: I loved Drag Bingo. Drag Bingo’s a lot of fun.

For Elston, Oktoberfest held the top spot.

ELSTON: I guess I have to say Oktoberfest because Phi Eta Sigma runs it, which I’m a part of. And it’s really great, and all the clubs get together. And just having a fun time on the lawn.

Both agreed that Halloween was a very good memory they looked forward to every year. 

LEE: Oh, my God, Halloween. We dressed up Sparkle and Mordecai this year. We were trying to win the costume contest, but we didn’t win.

ELSTON: That was fun. We should have, but we didn’t.

They both hope to see the Halloween event still running for the coming years.

LEE: Yeah, it’s a lot of fun to see everyone walk around on campus in their costumes and everything, because when do you see that anywhere?

Lee explains that it felt like she was back at home during the event.

LEE:  I’ve lived here all four years. My neighborhood growing up was really big on Halloween. To just live here and then there was nothing my freshman year, it was a little sad. But now it’s a lot of fun.

Elston really liked off-campus events and really enjoyed the most recent one: free ice cream cones at Meadows on Monday, April 13

ELSTON: I also like the off-campus events a lot. Like the cat cafe, and we went axe-throwing. That was fun. 

ELSTON: We just went to get meadows last night. Ice cream. That was really good. Oh, I was so happy. free ice cream. I love it.

Jerlysa Benjamin (bottom left), freshman nursing major, Elleann Nalema (top middle), freshman nursing major, and Ashley Cohen (bottom right), freshman nursing major, share their favorite memories of the first year at Pitt-Greensburg during the 2025-2026 year. 

For Cohen, it’s Halloween and Up All Night.

COHEN: My favorite memory has been the Halloween night where we did the trick or treating and then we came back, or the Up All Night and doing the stuffed animal activity and right before winter break, making the hot chocolate and stuff.

For Benjamin, it’s SOAR and Up All Night, too.

BENJAMIN: I would agree. Like, not even to be cheesy, I would say even orientation as well as SOAR, especially because I was so nervous, and once I got there, I really didn’t wanna leave. But yeah, I would say it’s Up all night. Yeah, that was actually really fun.

For Nalema, her best memory was meeting her friends, including Benjamin and Cohen.

NALEMA: I would say the same thing, mainly because I’m not someone who likes going out. But meeting these two very interesting people and our other friends, it convinced me to go out and have fun. And it’s a really nice experience, and I’m grateful for it.

All three are looking forward to Oktoberfest again. 

COHEN: I’m excited for Oktoberfest again.

Emily Druga (pictured above) is a senior data analytics major who’s graduating this May. She has many favorite memories during her four years here at Pitt-Greensburg, but a few stand out. 

Druga transferred in 2023 and has been attending Pitt-Greensburg for 3 years. Her favorite memories are interactions with different people during campus events.

DRUGA: I would say my favorite memories is just interacting with different people, where they come from, their background, and also attending all of the events on campus, whether it be Workforce Wednesdays, networking, or any of fun events we had here like the Relay for Life, the Decades of Hope or just any of the club events that I was able to be a part of or host. And just making really good memories, you know, with the people that you’re connecting with.

She harbors good memories of campus events, especially with the people she met and connected with during these events. 

One of her favourite memories is with the cinema club, as the vice president, she had the pleasure of being a part of many different events, and one of her favorite ones is the K-pop demon hunters trivia night she planned.

DRUGA: I would say my favorite memory, if I pick one, would definitely be, since I’m the vice president of the Cinema Club. We did an event back in September or October. We did a trivia thingy for the movie K-Pop Demon Hunters. I hosted it, my first time ever hosting something with the guys, and then we later watched the movie.

But if she had to pick her all-time favorite memory, it would be when she met her now best friend, Mariah.

DRUGA: I later met my now best friend Mariah at an event because she was sitting by herself doing homework, and I felt bad so I sat with her, and we just hung out, and then we became close friends ever since, and we’ve just been hanging out ever since. So if I had to pick one, that would be my, my top favorite one.