A Day in the life of Student Athlete, Oliver Perry

"My name is Oliver Perry I am a Student Athlete at New York Institute of Technology and I play on the soccer team. I have lived in the West End of Glasgow most of my life and went to the High School of Glasgow. I’ve been out in New York for about 8 months now and am loving it! I was initially interested in the whole soccer scholarship idea about 2 years ago, when I heard of Firstpoint USA through a friend. Once I decided that’s what I wanted to do I didn’t look back. After my SAT’s, my footage matches and a showcase game I received several offers from different colleges. The more memorable ones where: Lincoln Memorial University TN, St Leo’s FL, University of Hawaii Honolulu, St Thomas Aquinas University NY and finally NYIT. The financial side of the offer at NYIT was the sticking point for me though, although Hawaii did seem very attractive! So on the 14th of August 2011 I flew out to JFK airport to my new life in New York. The first test was two weeks of hard preseason preparation, which was unusually eventful. During my first two weeks, New York experienced it’s first earthquake and Hurricane for decades! However we survived and I was at the best physical condition I think I’ve ever been. After a grueling two weeks of early starts, long days and a lot of running pre season was over and we moved into dorms and school began. My new home consisted of 4 bed rooms, with two guys in each. We had particularly diverse pairings with 5 soccer players and 3 lacrosse payers in our suit. It is made up of 3 Americans, 1 Canadian, 2 English a Spaniard and a solitary Scot and to one toilet and shower everyday is a miracle. However we make it work and outside of that have a lot of fun here. Weekly we go out and enjoy the local nightlife or if feeling wealthy go for a night out in Manhattan. If we have a game or training the next day we may have a movie night in or just chill and catch up on work.  Weekends, again depending if we have a game or not we go into the City, every time finding something new to do or see. When it came to our season we had a successful year. We won every game at home, helping us to win our conference and make it to the last 32 of the national tournament. We trained hard, played hard and received our rewards, we are now in preparation for the new season and are feeling confident for the year ahead. We have a strong team bond in particular with the guys who all live together. I have enjoyed my time here so far, of course there have been some trying moments but we have got through them together and come out stronger. I would definitely recommend this experience to anyone who is interested and think it is an opportunity you can’t pass up." We would like to thank Oliver for taking the time out of his busy schedule to give us some insight into his life as a student-athlete in New York.  We wish Oliver continued success in his academic and athletic career.

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