James Franklin Loves Vandy Guides
Being a tour guide has many perks. We get cool swag (sweatshirts, water bottles, t-shirts), we get legitimate name tags and business cards (oooooo. ahhhhh), and we get to lead groups of 10-20 people around campus while bragging the black and gold out of the place we are privileged to call home for 4 years. We also receive love and attention from the man himself: James Franklin.
If you don’t know who James Franklin is, take a couple of deep breaths, hold you head in your hands in disappointment, and then click on this link right HERE. Actually, even if you know who he is, click on that link because it’s just wonderful.
Done reading? Good.
Amazing, right? His love for our school and devotion to our players, coaching staff and the Vanderbilt football program as a whole, not to mention the way that he’s been able to change the atmosphere of the program here, is phenomenal. We went from having a 2-10 record my first year here to going to back-to-back bowl games, WINNING last year’s Music City bowl game, and finishing off the season with 9 wins and the the longest winning streak in the SEC. And all of this success is obviously not going unnoticed since we have a top 20 recruiting class this season. The perception of Vanderbilt Football on campus, in the city, and in the country is shifting for the best, and I am SO honored to be a part of the magic from the start.
Well, this guy is devoted to all things Vanderbilt, so he makes it a point to visit the tour guides a few times a year and essentially opens up the floor with a Q&A session for an hour. Yesterday was a particularly important meeting because it was the night we officially welcomed our newest additions to the tour guide family! Over 380 students applied to be new guides and 70 were chosen. To you prospective students/families out there, Vanderbilt has just added some amazing resources for you all to ask questions and get even MORE perspectives of student life. They’ll start shadowing tours, undergo training before school starts, and will be pushed out of the nest and leading their own tours by the middle of next semester.
But back to football. It’s awesome. James Franklin is, in fact, the man. And the annual spring “Black and Gold” game is just weeks away, where we will get to see first-hand how the team has been improving in the off-season!!!!!!!! It’s so good to be gold. And loved by James Franklin.