You couldn’t be on campus this week without seeing members of the Class of 2017 and their families. Our overnight orientations kicked off on Monday with more than 400 families, and 300 more arrived on Thursday. Our final orientation will begin on Monday, and we are expecting 500 families then. While here, the students attended everything from academic sessions to presentations on Greek life, clubs, sports and more. They also had a chance to meet future classmates, register for classes and meet with their advisers. Parents had separate sessions on such topics as financial aid, the core curriculum and faculty expectations. Parents also had the option of spending the night in the residence halls, and many took us up on that. I always enjoy the opportunity each spring to welcome the incoming class and to start to get to know them.
Kevin Flannery of Dingle Oceanworld recently presented part of the transatlantic cable that ran from Valentia Island in Ireland to Heart Content in Newfoundland to representatives from SHU to honor the special relationship we have with Oceanworld. The cable was laid between 1854 and 1866 to allow for telegraph communications between North America and Europe, and a piece of the cable was recently recovered by local fishermen. A group of our students were in Dingle recently to participate in a new coastal ecology program at Oceanworld. We are looking forward to more great things to come from this exciting collaboration.
Josh Shuart and Brian Farrell.
A group of SHU employees were on hand at the BRBC’s annual meeting yesterday to pick up the Green Business Award. Paul Healey accepted the award on behalf of the team that was responsible for our victory. Although we all play a part in making SHU as green as possible, special thanks go out to:
- Mary Lou DeRosa for special academic programs on the environment
- Trigona Mililli for the Green Cleaning Program
- Jeffery Barrett for compliance for hazardous wastes
- Ed Dobransky for single-stream waste management
- Ben Benson for the hybrid vehicle program
Congratulations to all!
It was presented by Tom Santa, president and CEO of Santa Fuel.
Nathan Lewis is working toward completion of the mural that will be installed outside of Red’s in the fall. I thought you would enjoy seeing some photos of the work-in-progress. It is going to be a wonderful representation of everything that SHU encompasses, and I can’t wait to see the finished product!
We will be hosting the
Thirteenth General Meeting of the
International Thomas Merton Society next week, beginning on Thursday. The four-day event will include
renowned speakers, workshops, panel and roundtable discussions and more. I
especially encourage you to attend our Third Annual Henri Nouwen Lecture
on Contemporary Spirituality, which will take place Saturday evening at 8 p.m.
in the Chapel of the Holy Spirit. The speaker will be Roman Catholic Priest
Ronald Rolheiser, president of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio. He is a
community-builder, lecturer and writer and an outstanding speaker.
Last, but not least, I want to wish the best of luck to Jerry
Goehring at the Tony Awards this weekend. His musical adaptation of Jean
Shepherd’s film, A Christmas Story,
was nominated for Best Musical, Best Score and Best Book.
I know we will all be glued to our television sets and cheering him on Sunday
evening. Win or lose, we are lucky to have him as part of our community to
share his expertise, creativity and talent with our students
Have a great weekend!