By Jordan McSpadden

Anne Cohen ’11 has been recruited to Johns Hopkins University for volleyball. She has been playing for the Wolverines for six years. Cohen’s position on the team is Libero.

“I can only play in the back row and I wear a jersey which is a color opposite from my team to allow the refs to recognize me,” said Cohen. “My coach can move me in and out of the game without an official substitution. Essentially, my job is to pass balls on serve receive and play defense. I help my teammates score points.”

Cohen was also recruited to University of Chicago, but she eventually chose Johns Hopkins University over University of Chicago because she said she “felt that Johns Hopkins was better suited to my academic interests and athletic pursuits.”

For Cohen, the process to committing to Johns Hopkins started with her making contact with the volleyball coach by e-mailing him. The coach then came to watch her play during volleyball club season and eventually, she went to the Johns Hopkins volleyball camp during the summer where she met the team and stayed on campus. This process ended with the coach offering Cohen a spot on the 2011 Johns Hopkins volleyball team.

“I didn’t really know that much about the different colleges and options available to me,” said Cohen. “When I visited colleges over Spring Break, we added Johns Hopkins to the list as a university that had a lot of the attributes I was looking for in a college. During the tour and presentation, I kept liking the school more and more, and now I’m so glad that I found it. JHU is an ideal place for me, allowing me to follow and expand my interest in the sciences and also to balance academics with volleyball. For me, it offers just the right combination in a school.”

Cohen said that she would like to continue playing volleyball all throughout colleges because she loves the sport and it is hard for her to imagine going to school without it.