At UNC, our academics are amazing, our basketball is legendary and our school spirit is out of this world. The fact that some really cool people have chosen to come to this amazing school isn’t surprising. I’m going to focus on six notable people, some of whom you may not have known went to UNC.
- Michael Jordan
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I started with an easy one. I don’t need to tell you who this is, but in case you don’t know, this is the one, the only, Michael Jordan! After all, “the ceiling is the roof.” Jordan was a member of our 1982 National Championship winning team and is known as one of the greatest basketball players of all time. Plus, he is the star of Space Jam, which is still one of the best movies ever. He’s an incredible man. We love Jordan. We are Jordan.
- Jenny Han
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You may have seen Netflix’s movie To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, but did you know the book trilogy was based on and has ties to UNC? Not only did the author, Jenny Han, spend her undergrad years at UNC, but part of the last book in the trilogy takes place in Chapel Hill. The book focuses on Franklin Street, Cat’s Cradle and our iconic Old Well. Hopefully, with Netflix giving us a sequel, there may be hope for a UNC cameo in the third movie. Fingers crossed!
- Mamrie Hart
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A popular Youtuber and content creator, Mamrie Hart graduated from UNC with a degree in Drama and Communications. She is known for making drinks and terrible puns on her Youtube channel, but she has also written two books. She even came to Chapel Hill last spring for a book signing. Mamrie also wrote and starred in the movies Camp Takota and Dirty Thirty. Just recently, she started a podcast called “This Might Get Weird” with her friend and fellow content creator, Grace Helbig.
- Ken Jeong
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You may know this Comedian from the Hangover trilogy, Crazy Rich Asians or the many other films and TV shows in which he has acted. What you may not know is that Ken Jeong is a doctor! He received his MD from UNC and is a licensed physician in California. Though he stopped practicing medicine to focus on acting, he will always be a Tar Heel. He may have gone to Duke for undergrad, but we don’t talk about that. He made the right choice in the end.
- Sarah Dessen
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Sarah Dessen is a well-known YA author who once taught here at UNC! She lives in Chapel Hill with her family and was once a Creative Writing major at UNC. If you read teen romance books, odds are you have read at least one of her best-selling books. She often does book signings at Flyleaf Books, here in Chapel Hill. Her next book, The Rest Of The Story, comes out in June.
- Peyton Reed
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Peyton Reed is a film director who has directed movies like Bring it On and Yes Man, starring Jim Carrey. Most notably, he joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe, finishing Ant-Man after Edgar Wright’s departure. Reed also directed Ant-Man and the Wasp, which came out this past summer. In 2015, Reed came back to his alma mater to speak at UNC’s Media and Journalism School’s Stembler Lecture as a featured guest.
Those are just six people in our Carolina Family. There are many people who could be on this list, including our 11th president, James K. Polk, and famous writer Thomas Wolfe. The list of sports legends from UNC alone could fill an entire book, but many of the people on this list were people I didn’t know went to Chapel Hill until I started researching notable alumni, which I thought was cool.