Meet Ian Rice, Physics & Film

My name is Ian Rice, and I’m a junior [now senior] here at Wesleyan. I study physics and film, and I'm originally from Boise, Idaho. Wesleyan has been a huge place of growth for me. A big part of it is just being in such an active arts community. Being exposed to people who know so much about art kind of just rubs off on you, and you learn a lot just by knowing people. Beyond that, it's been a lot of ideological expansion. I came from the Northwest, from Idaho, which isn’t necessarily the most diverse place. Wesleyan has a great level of diversity and all sorts of different people. Being exposed to different people's experiences and struggles is a really eye-opening thing. It’s something that is really beneficial about going here. My major is something people always ask me about, since physics and film are so different. But that's what is appealing about it. There are two sides of me. I really like the arts, but I also really like empirical studies and objectivity, and I feel like this was a perfect combination of them. Wesleyan is a fantastic school because of its passionate students. Everyone’s so interested in what everyone else is doing, and I think what I narrow that down to is community. 

Wesleyan is a relatively small school, and it really feels like it has a distinct identity that is active in a lot of different areas in really unique ways. There's a lot of interchange between ideas and passions and interests, and you gain a lot from being surrounded by that. I think that's really the best thing about any place, and Wesleyan has that in a really strong way.