Avila a double-degree payoff
Leap
OF faith landS
It’s a long way from the streets of Queens to the rolling hills of Pennsylvania, but for one Slippery Rock University alumnus, his “leap of faith” proved the road less traveled did make all the difference. Eric Avila isn’t your typical Slippery Rock University graduate. He might be the only one who never completed an application for admission, and his first impressions of the rural western Pennsylvania campus won’t be found in any student recruitment materials. Today, though, Avila’s happy he decided to take the journey from New York to Slippery Rock. He’s a proud Rock alumnus, the owner of not one but two degrees from SRU. “I’m proud to say I’m from Slippery Rock University,” Avila said. “I tell everyone I can what a great education I got and what a great place it is, how it made me grow up faster and let me make a lot of lifelong friends.” It’s hard to believe Avila was once a reluctant Rocker. In the end, Avila followed the example of his parents and took a leap of faith that has paid huge dividends. Upon graduation from Richmond Hill High School in 2006, Avila had his sights I’m proud to say I’m from set on attending either the University of Tampa or the University of Miami in Slippery Rock University. sunny Florida. I tell everyone I can what Avila was admitted to Miami, but never a great education I got and completed the financial aid forms because he knew it would be too expensive to what a great place it is, attend school there. He loved Tampa, how it made me grow up but it was simply too far from home, the faster and let me make a Jamaica, N.Y. native decided. His focus then turned to finding a collot of lifelong friends. lege closer to home, someplace with an NCAA Division II baseball program and a sports medicine curriculum. Avila’s list of potential schools included three names: Slippery Rock, Shippensburg University in central Pennsylvania and Pfeiffer College in North Carolina. Not necessarily in that order. In stepped fate, in the form of Avila’s oldest brother, Larry Rodriguez. “Larry filled out and submitted my admission application,” Avila said. “He didn’t tell me what he had done until one week before I got the letter I had been accepted.” Now that he had been admitted to The Rock, the next step was to actually visit the campus. Avila’s first impression of Slippery Rock: “There were a lot of cows and a lot of trees, it wasn’t diverse enough and it’s got a funny name.”
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