Isabella Rodriguez hopes to discover ways mechanical engineering can help untangle society’s challenges. Matthew Jordan wants to explore how politics can change people’s daily lives. And Sara Horvath plans to pivot after 21 years in the U.S. Navy to study sustainable farming systems.
They’re among the 3,861 first-year students and 640 transfers who begin moving to campus Aug. 18, hailing from all 50 states, plus Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and the Mariana Islands, and 97 countries.
“The Class of 2029 brims with a clear, and very Cornellian, passion to do the greatest good – to pursue research, learn across boundaries, seek out innovation and connect with new people,” said Lisa Nishii, senior vice provost for enrollment management and undergraduate education. “As we welcome this new class of students, I look forward to seeing the ways they shape and are shaped by our community.”
The Class of 2029 will be Cornell’s largest ever, and 18% of the students will be the first in their families to attend college. New students move in Aug. 18-19, and New Student Orientation takes place from Aug. 18-24. President Michael I. Kotlikoff will welcome students and their families to the university during New Student Convocation on Aug. 19 at 3 p.m. at Schoellkopf Field, and returning students will move in Aug. 20-22.
Nikhil and Emil Damji competed in the Youth Sailing World Championships in Lake Garda, Italy, in 2024.
Move-in will be a family affair for Emil and Nikhil Damji – twin brothers who both plan to study hotel administration in the Cornell Peter and Stephanie Nolan School of Hotel Administration in the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business.
Attending the same college was never their plan.
“But at the end of the day Cornell is an amazing school and we both really loved it,” Emil Damji said. “It’s really big, so we’ll have a lot of opportunities to branch out.”
The Damjis live in Kirkland, Washington, and have dual citizenship in the U.S. and Canada. They grew up playing sports, including sailing and skiing. In 2023 and 2024, they competed in the Youth Sailing World Championships for the Canadian National Team.
“Those have probably been the best weeks of my life,” Nikhil Damji said. “You meet such cool people from all over the world.”
They plan to compete as members of Cornell’s co-ed sailing team.
And they’re hoping to continue their passion for coaching athletes with disabilities. In February they volunteered at the Invictus Games for wounded veterans from all over the world. The interdisciplinary nature of the Cornell community could help engineer better equipment for adaptive sports, Emil Damji said. “There are a lot of opportunities there.”
A desire to help people via a career in politics drew Jordan to the Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy. He will spend his first semester in Washington, D.C., as part of the inaugural cohort of students in the school’s DC Start program for undergraduates studying public policy or health care policy.
He found his love of politics in middle school. He served in student government, participated in Model United Nations and interned with city and county lawmakers.
“I’ve always had a fascination with politics and the transformative power it can have on people’s everyday life,” he said. From Brooklyn, Jordan will be one of the 1,202 new students from New York state.
He looks forward to exploring and expanding his interests at Cornell. “At Cornell, you really get that sense of discovery,” he said. “That was something that I really appreciated.”
Horvath, one of 15 incoming veterans or active-duty servicemembers in the incoming class, developed a love of learning during her time in the Navy.
She served as a military police officer, protecting bases overseas, working on an aircraft carrier and teaching at a police academy in San Antonio, Texas. She also took college-level classes.
The Ithaca native never thought she would attend Cornell, but “I got better at being a student, and Cornell felt right for me,” she said.
“It was quite a career,” she said, “traveling around and moving to different places and starting over and over and over.” Now she’s looking forward to being near her family. “I’ve been away from them for half my life,” she said.
Isabella Rodriguez plans to study mechanical engineering at Cornell.
She attended Tompkins Cortland Community College to get one last pre-requisite and is entering Cornell as a junior, studying agriculture science in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
She plans to pursue a new career path in farming. “I’m so curious about just everything in agriculture,” she said, “from the soil to how plants work, to making sure we’re designing agriculture systems in a way that is sustainable, which is really important.”
Rodriguez, of Canyon Lake, Texas, hopes to discover ways to help untangle society’s challenges when she begins her mechanical engineering studies in Cornell Engineering.
“There are a bunch of problems in the world that need to be solved,” she said, “and engineering could be key to solving most of them.”
As much as academic rigor is important to her, she’s looking forward to meeting new people and expanding her worldview – and maybe visiting the Cornell Dairy Bar.
“The energy that I feel coming from Cornell is friendly and eclectic,” she said, “but I’m most looking forward to being surrounded by brilliant minds.”