Furtney commits to Bucknell
Kaitlyn Furtney still can’t believe her rowing dream has come true.
The 17-year-old, Grade 12 student at E.L. Crossley has accepted a scholarship offer from Bucknell University, a Division 1 school in Pennsylvania for the 2025-26 school year.
“It all feels really surreal,” Furtney smiled. “They reached out to me for rowing in Grade 11, I think it was November and they said they wanted me to come down for a visit.”
Furtney visited the school last fall and again in February. On her third trip in July, they offered her the scholarship which she had to keep to herself until it became official.
“I knew all the people that I was going in with, a lot of my friends from around America are going and I have a friend in Toronto I race against her all the time to go together,” she said. “It feels really, really good to have it out of the way.”
Furtney can’t wait to get started.
“I just feel it’s so much that I get to look forward to. I know where I’m going, I just have to figure out what I’m gonna do when I’m there.”
Furtney, who plans to major in either education or English, loves everything about the school, which is located in Lewisburg, about a four-and-a-half hour drive from her home.
“They have really small class sizes. I think it’s an average of 18 to 20 kids per class and it’s a gorgeous campus and there’s only 3,000 students. So I feel less of a number and more of a person to them,” she said. “I feel like it actually matters what we’re doing. And we went there and I got to meet the current team and they were super nice and super positive.”
Furtney feels a smaller school fits her best.
“I think I always wanted a smaller school because I had also been talking to Washington and Florida. There’s 80,000 people on campus and it’s massive and it’s just so confusing. It’s almost like if you’re there nobody will even know if you’re there.”
Furtney began rowing in Grade 8 but was far from an overnight sensation.
“Maybe a year-and-a-half in and had no idea what I was doing. I put (flipped) my boat in the middle of the canal and it was in middle of March,” she laughed. “I just wanted to master it at that point.”
Furtney said rowing has brought her a sense of community.
“Rowing is kind of like my own family now,” she said. “I have my family at home, my friends at school, and then I go to rowing and it’s the same people every day and it just like makes me feel happy to be out on the water with them.”
Furtney tipped her cap to longtime Crossley rowing coach John Ruscitti, when asked what keeps her going when things get tough on the water.
“I honestly think it’s motivation and dedication. I think knowing that Mr. Ruscitti is going to be there and if he’s there then we have to be there because his job is a lot harder than ours.”
Furtney has a long and impressive rowing resume including a gold medal in the senior women’s eight and senior women’s quad at the 2024 Canadian Secondary School Rowing Association Regatta; gold in the women’s quad at the 2023 Head of Schuylkill Regatta; silver in the junior women’s lightweight 63kg four at the 2023 CSSRA Regatta; and, placed 41st out of 115 in the U17 division at the 2023 World Rowing Indoor Championships.
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