Class of 2023 Ring Delivery held Oct. 10 at Moakley Courthouse
Over 1,000 juniors attended weekend in-person event
Ring Delivery for the MIT Class of 2023 took place Sunday, Oct. 10 at the John Joseph Moakley United States Courthouse. The Class of 2023 Ring Committee (RingComm) estimates that just over 1,000 students out of 1,108 attended the event.
Ring Delivery was well received by students. Kwame Connell ’23 said in an interview with The Tech that the event was “a lot of fun” and served as “a good marker” of the halfway point of his time at MIT.
Nghi Nguyen ’23 called the event “memorable” in an interview with The Tech and said she had many “fun moments” with her friends. Nguyen also commended the planning behind the event and the 2023 Brass Rat in general, “especially during COVID last semester” when students “were on campus, but everything was still online.”
RingComm Ring Delivery Co-Chair Brady Sullivan ’23 detailed the planning process in an interview with The Tech, explaining that once Ring Delivery was postponed beyond its usual date during the 2021 spring semester, “the biggest piece of news” RingComm waited for was the decision on whether students would return to campus in the fall.
Sullivan said that once it was confirmed the fall semester would be completely in person, “it was rapid fire emails contacting vendors and making sure everything would be in place for the event,” with August being “the biggest and busiest time for getting everything put together.”
RingComm Chair Ananya Gurumurthy ’23 said in an interview with The Tech that “there were a lot of factors that played into” choosing the venue for Ring Delivery. These included “capacity limitations” and “how easy it would be for MIT students to get there.” Gurumurthy noted that RingComm was “planning under a lot of uncertainty” and that they prioritized finding a “stable venue” that wouldn’t “fall through.”
RingComm Ring Delivery Co-Chair Tejal Reddy ’23 told The Tech in an interview that Moakley Courthouse was “perfect in terms of COVID because it allowed people to have an experience outside the venue as well.” Reddy added that the waterfront was a feature of the venue and that “people were out there all night taking pictures.”
When asked about any aspects of the event that did not go exactly as planned, Reddy said that while RingComm expected around 400 people to show up in the first hour, most students “showed up right at 7 p.m., which was a really pleasant surprise.”
Sullivan said the long line to enter the courthouse meant Ring Delivery was “slow to get started,” but the process of “getting people through security and checked in” eventually smoothed out.
Emmeline MacPherson ’23 expressed in an interview with The Tech that the Class of 2023 didn’t know what to expect of the event since “nobody on campus right now has had a Ring Delivery” and the class “didn’t have a normal Ring Premiere.” MacPherson said that despite that, RingComm was “super informative.”
Connell said that being able to have Ring Delivery “despite the pandemic” made him “appreciate it a bit more.” He said throughout the evening he “saw so many faces” he “hadn’t seen that much of” being off campus, and that it was “really cool to see everyone in one place.”
Nguyen echoed the sentiment, describing Ring Delivery as “a very nice event” for the Class of 2023 “to be together” and “a slow sign of everything coming back to normal.”
Gurumurthy expressed that “Delivery is always such a special event” and praised Reddy and Sullivan for doing “an amazing job planning it.” She said considering what the Class of 2023 has “had to go through with COVID and not having in-person events,” RingComm feels “so grateful” to have gotten to “present this kind of an event” to their class, and is “so happy everyone enjoyed it.”