We’re still here: Max Mindiola ’20

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Max Mindiola ’20 of Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin, will fulfill a lifelong dream when he enters dental school this fall. Mindiola will be attending Creighton University School of Dental Medicine in Omaha, Nebraska. At Ripon, he is a biology major with a chemistry minor.

“The most important lesson I learned at Ripon is that feeling at home and comfortable is the key to success and happiness,” Mindiola says. “Whatever your goals may be, they are only going to come to fruition by being somewhere that makes you comfortable and feel at home. When that is the case, as it was for me at Ripon, the other worries and stressors of college life are decreased. Although it certainly is tough at times, it was that much easier for me to get through the tough times because my friends, professors and coaches always made Ripon feel like home. It was because of that feeling of belonging and sense of community that I was able to get into dental school which has been my goal since I was a child.”

He says that during the current off-campus session, “What I miss the most about Ripon is just the simple day-to-day tasks of walking to class with my friends, having dinner with my teammates or apartment roommates, watching movies with my fraternity brothers, interacting with professors daily, those sort of everyday activities that most Ripon college students are always busy with,” Mindiola says. “ I find myself coping mostly by trying to keep in contact with my friends, especially my roommates, and taking any opportunity I get to have some sort of face-to-face, live interaction like I got while I was on campus, which is mostly via Zoom now. Having my family dog around helps me cope as well.”