Sydney Mills '21 Recruiting Profile

I have to thank my little brother for my swimming career. When we were learning to swim, it took him a little longer to master the free style for my parents’ comfort level. Meantime, I advanced through the levels until the instructor said I was ready for the team. I started swimming competitively in second grade. I swim with my winter club team, North Jersey Barracudas from September through July; my high school team, Newton Lenape Valley from September through February; and our town's summer recreation team, Newton Sharks in July.

Yes, the seasons do overlap, but I learn different things from each team. Of course the winter team is the most competitive and I do get my best times with them. But I think I really learned the true meaning of team, from high school swim relays. There’s nothing like combining club swimmers, with novices, athletes from other sports and pushing each other to win. I have experienced that level of team spirit and camaraderie with band and dance. However, high school was the first time I experienced it with swim. With our summer recreation team, I get to share what I've learned and encourage the younger swimmers. For my junior year, I've decided to give up dance classes and focus on swim. As my club coach says, just think of how much faster you can get if you made all of your practices. Aside from the relays, my favorite swim strokes are back, fly and long distance free. I hope that the competitiveness, team spirit and camaraderie that I've learned from my swim teams will blossom in college and I'll be an asset to the team.

With an overall GPA of 3.59 and current ranking 53 out of 161 students, clearly I can do better academically.  Sometimes I rely on natural ability when my dance, band and swim seasons overlap.  I need to study more. I'm striving to do better this my upcoming junior year and have dropped dance which should help me reach this goal.  My favorite subjects are science, biology and history.  I hope that my love of science and physical activity will be a plus in my goal to study Exercise Science.