Freshman secondary education major, Dennis McDermott, can usually be spotted on campus wearing an iconically orange
bucket hat.

“The bucket hat, there’s not really a story,” McDermott said. “A friend gave it to me in Nebraska and I wear it because I don’t want to mess with my hair in the mornings. I don’t want to wake up early enough to mess with my hair so I just wear it every day. I can’t believe it became iconic because of that, is the funny part.”

McDermott said people have taken to his bucket hat so much that they started to buy him variations of bucket hats.

“People are getting me bucket hats so I can diversify a little bit, I got a nice green bucket hat that matches Point Park so that’s great,” McDermott said.

McDermott, who moved to Pennsylvania recently, wasn’t sure where he wanted to attend university at first, but once he visited Point Park, he knew he was in the right place.

“I loved visiting here. It was like the best place I’d ever been,” McDermott said. “I don’t know why but I’ve never had the idea of like the university being only three buildings and you take an elevator everywhere and I love that for some reason and I still do.”

McDermott is from a small town in rural Nebraska with a population of about 1,000 and coming to the big city has been a change in his everyday life.

“I can’t believe that I’m here, I go out and take my bike to work and stuff like that and I look up at the buildings surrounding me and it’s like ‘Wow, this is happening,’” McDermott said.

While at Point Park, McDermott has gotten involved with several clubs including one that he started himself, The Ultimate Frisbee Club.

“I just started that because I played a little in Nebraska but it wasn’t ever a club sport or anything,” McDermott said. “Then I moved to Pennsylvania and there was a team here at the high school that I went to and I was like ‘This is really fun and I’m actually decent at it.’”

The club has gotten a lot of interest thus far. They are hoping to do more with the club and heavily advertise this spring semester.

WPPJ Radio Station has become one of McDermott’s favorite parts of coming to college. He started his own show, ‘Sad Fella Hours’, which quickly became as iconic as his orange bucket hat.

“There was a meme-y thing like ‘sad fella hours’ for the longest time,” McDermott said. “And I wanted to start a radio show and I don’t know how I decided that but I just did and I just loved it.”

McDermott serves as a senator in the legislative body of the United Student Government (USG). He sits on the rules committee that is very involved with the clubs on campus.

“I just love working with all the clubs and asking students what’s going on and then maybe even trying to fix some of that for them,” McDermott said.

Politics is an area that McDermott could see himself getting into in the future and he views this as a stepping stone and a learning experience. In the upcoming semesters, he plans to stay in USG and continue to support and voice the concerns of the student body.

“I’d like to stay a senator ideally because I feel like I can have the most impact,” McDermott said. “But ultimately if I feel like I need to get into another position to make a bigger impact or something like that then, yeah, I would do that as well.”