Winter 2007
The Center of Student Life
Student Club Spotlight
What's New at Fairfield U.?
Parents' Weekend
Parents' Committee
Focus on Faculty
First-Year Student Send-offs
by Lisa Roberts
Randomly ask patrons of the John A. Barone Campus Center what's the best feature of the building, and the response is always the same. "Location, location, location," Ryan T. Blair '07 puts it succinctly. "It's prime real estate on campus." As editor-in-chief of The Mirror, Fairfield's student-run newspaper, Blair easily logs in 40 hours a week at Barone. Rattling off such amenities as food services, mailboxes, and simple directions to meetings, Blair is convinced it's the best location on campus for student club activity. "There are no cons to this building," he adds, without hesitation.
Tim Dee '08, a member of the Fairfield University Student Association (FUSA) who works in the student activities office and as a building manager, believes Barone is a hub for students "because every non-academic office is here. If you're in the wrong place, you're not far from the right place." In addition to the student-run offices of FUSA, The Mirror, and WVOF radio, Barone houses the offices of Student Activities and Facilities, Dean of Students, Residence Life, and the Center for Multicultural Relations, as well as the campus bookstore, post office, and three dining facilities. "There's positive energy all around," says Dee. "From student activities to residential life, everyone wants to make sure you know they're here to support you."
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A group of Barone Campus Center regulars take a moment to smile fr the camera in the lobby of Fairfield's "prime real estate" for students. |
While the Campus Center is not yet Fairfield's equivalent of Grand Central Terminal, the University is expanding the use of its lounge and lobby, notes Dr. Thomas Pellegrino, dean of students, and "we're getting there." The recent moves of Residence Life and the Center for Multicultural Relations out of the residence halls and into Barone were designed to enhance daily student life. "This is where you come to eat, get your mail, buy your books, grab a cup of coffee, work out roommate issues, develop leadership skills, and congregate with others through the Multicultural Center, student clubs, and meetings in the Oak Room," Pellegrino explains. "Since 80 percent of students' waking hours are spent outside the classroom, we want to maximize students' use of the Barone Campus Center and its many offerings."
The convenient location of the Center, down the main boulevard on campus, is a familiar path for Karen Donoghue '03, a past FUSA president who was recently hired by the University as associate director of Residence Life. A heartbeat away every day from her old stomping ground in FUSA, Donoghue's ties to Fairfield strengthen daily in her new role as a University administrator. "Barone feels like a different place altogether from when I was a student," she says. She believes the move of Residence Life to Barone is particularly student-friendly, pointing to the increase in residential programming attendance now that all schedules are advertised not only in the individual residence halls, but on a central billboard in Barone. Now students can see what's going on in all the buildings, not just their own, so attendance is up across the board, she points out.
In addition, according to Donoghue, the channels of communication between the administrative offices located in Barone are much more open under one roof. "Just getting together for a bite to eat in the middle of our workday enhances our communication and programming efforts, which ultimately helps us produce a better product for our students," she says. "I'm thrilled to be back at the University as part of the effort to provide enhanced services that will make the living and learning experience at Fairfield the best that it can be."
Save the date
57th Commencement - May 20, 2007
Need Commencement Tickets? Every graduating senior receives five tickets, but parents may enter a lottery for two extra tickets by sending a letter requesting them, postmarked no later than Jan. 31, 2007, to:
Additional Commencement Tickets
Fairfield University
1073 North Benson Road, Box A
Fairfield, CT 06824-5195
For more info, go to: www.fairfield.edu/commencement
Snow Sports
Whether students have a love for surfing or sailing, ballroom or break dancing, horse racing or bicycling, the opportunity to find fellow enthusiasts is just a mouse click away at www.fairfield.edu/studentclubs. Inspired by Fairfield students looking to connect with others who share their interests, this list grows every year. Last year it grew with the Snow Sports Club, founded by David Gindek '07, a transfer and commuter student who was looking to meet more Fairfield friends who share his love for outdoor winter activities. With the help of a friend, Jen Kelly '06, he gathered the 10 signatures he needed to go before the student activities board, and then advertised the first meeting through campus announcements, fliers around campus, and a poster on a bulletin board in the Barone Campus Center. "We would have been happy if 20 students showed up," says Gindek. "We were shocked when there were 20 at the door before the meeting began, and 70 altogether before it ended." In its first year, the popularity of the Snow Sports Club led to nearly 250 members, a half dozen trips from Mohawk Mountain in Connecticut to Killington in Vermont, and a nomination for "Club of the Year" at the annual Stag Awards. Gindek credits the club's initial success to its informal, recreational nature, designed to meet the interests of the group rather than enforcing a set agenda or sporting a competitive streak. "Plus it's no cost to join," says Gindek. For further information, contact snowsports@stagweb.fairfield.edu or visit www.students.fairfield.edu/snowsports.
The Cura Personalis Mentoring Program
In line with the University's strategic plan to embrace diversity, the Center for Multicultural Relations launched a new mentorship program for all first-year students, with a special welcome to the 166 AHANA (African-American, Hispanic, Asian, Native American) students in the Class of 2010. Modeled after successful mentoring programs for AHANA students at other universities, the Cura Personalis Mentoring Program (CPMP) will help smooth the transition to college life for all those interested.
By participating in the CPMP, students have an opportunity to build relationships and friendships with faculty and staff. Each participant, referred to as a scholar protégé, is paired with a faculty/staff mentor as well as a student mentor, with one-on-one mentoring, small group meetings, and large group sessions planned throughout the year. These supporters can help the scholar protégés navigate through their college years as well as serve as valuable resources and credible references for future career and/or educational pursuits.
 "I'm very passionate about mentorship programs because they work," says La'Kicia Fuller, assistant director of Multicultural Relations who joined Fairfield this past summer. Fuller participated in a mentorship program at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C. and coordinated a similar program at Elon University in Elon, N.C. "A lot of students use the first month or two of college to see if it's really the right fit for them, so it's important to establish networks early on. What's exciting about Fairfield's program is that everyone who's participating really wants to be here - and judging from the number of faculty/staff mentors who responded to our initial call, this is a program that will grow strong over the years."
Fairfield's program kicked off on Sept. 28 with nearly 100 participants, including 32 faculty/staff mentors, 18 student mentors, and 47 scholar protégés. The orientation meeting featured introductions between scholar protégés and their mentors, a discussion of the program design, an address by Head Men's Basketball Coach, Ed Cooley, and a play on overcoming cultural barriers co-sponsored by the Fairfield University Student Association and the Center for Multicultural Relations. In the Jesuit tradition of developing the "whole" person in body, mind, and spirit (cura personalis), topics to be explored in upcoming months include time management, wellness, spirituality, leadership, character, and personal growth and development.
In addition, research shows that students who have mentors achieve greater academic success, are more satisfied with their college experience, and are more likely to graduate than those students without a mentor. "While the CPMP is designed to help AHANA students acclimate to college life, we want to stay open to all incoming freshmen who are interested in any type of mentorship relationship," says Fuller. "It's not too late to sign up, and a very enthusiastic group of faculty, staff, and student mentors are at the ready." For further information, contact Fuller at lfuller@mail.fairfield.edu or Lizette Ortiz at lortiz@mail.fairfield.edu.
Hundreds of families celebrated Parents' Weekend on campus Oct. 21 and 22. Parents took part in many interesting workshops and hands-on activities with their sons and daughters. Some of the weekend's events included:
- A welcome address by University President Jeffrey P. von Arx, S.J., at the Regina A. Quick Center for the Arts.
- Numerous faculty- and administrator-led sessions on topics including internships, study abroad, the Center for Academic Excellence, career planning, and the Ignatian Residential College.
- An afternoon jamboree in the John A. Barone Campus Center showcasing a variety of student musical performances and tours of various offices, including the Fairfield University Student Association (FUSA); The Mirror, the University's independent student newspaper; and WVOF, Fairfield's non-commercial, educational college radio station.
- Parents' Weekend Mass, celebrated by Fr. von Arx with Fairfield's Glee Club and Chamber singers, providing the liturgical music.
- Juston McKinney's comedy act Saturday night, which was co-sponsored by the Fairfield University Student Association (FUSA).
- A Sunday afternoon concert with the celebrated 100-voice Fairfield University Glee Club, under the direction of Dr. Carole Ann Maxwell. Exciting and innovative music gave parents and students alike a preview of their 2006-07 concert season.
We hope all who attended enjoyed these campus activities. If you have any comments or suggestions regarding Parents' Weekend, please e-mail ose@mail.fairfield.edu.
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During Parents' Weekend, the University Bookstore located in the Barone Campus Center was packed with Fairfield families - like the one shown here - shopping for official Fairfield apparel, accessories, and keepsakes. |
| Parents, grandparents, students, and siblings share a laugh during a live performance of Theatre Fairfield's resident improvisational group, On The Spot, and its apprentice group, In the Spit. |
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Fr. von Arx greeted parents at a backstage reception for President's Circle members during Parents' Weekend. |
Fairfield on the Road
Every year, Fairfield takes to the road with events planned at many locations throughout the country. Whether a reception with Fairfield's president, Jeffrey P. von Arx, S.J., a workshop on financing your child's education, or a Stags' game, parents are welcome at virtually all off-campus events. Many of these are planned and run by Fairfield's Office of Alumni Relations, which has scheduled events from September through May in Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Florida, Puerto Rico, New York, California, New Jersey, and Chicago, as well as locally in Hartford, New Haven, and Fairfield counties. Visit www.fairfield.edu/alumni and look for the calendar on the right side of the Web page to find out about events in your neighborhood. And remember - you don't have to have a son or daughter on a team to enjoy meeting other parents and promoting that Fairfield spirit at the Stags' away games! We need your enthusiasm and support in the stands. For Stags' game schedules, click on http://fairfieldstags.cstv.com/
The Parents' Committee enhances the quality of student life and learning by raising funds from parents of current students and parents of alumni. The committee works to actively engage parents in a variety of activities and forwards parent comments and concerns to the University's administration. Joe and Joan Maher, parents of Christina '07, are chairing the Committee this year. For a full list of Committee members, visit: http://www.fairfield.edu/as_gradfac.html
 A number of first-year parents recently joined the Parents' Committee, including Chuck and Joanne Piluso P'10 (first on left and last on right) and Michael and Hanne Donovan P'10 (center). Also pictured here is little sister Olivia Piluso. The Committee, currently comprising 50 Fairfield families, kicked off the fundraising efforts during Parents' Weekend for the 2006-07 Parents' Annual Fund goal of $675,000.
Ways to Give
Parents' Committee members Jerry Braverman and Anita Miranda P'09 are challenging all Fairfield parents to join The President's Circle or renew their membership by November 15, 2006 with a gift to the Parents' Annual Fund.
All who do (or who have done so since July 1, 2006) will have the chance at being the recipients of a seven-day stay during the prime President's week of February 18-25, 2007 at their timeshare at the beautiful Hyatt Beach House resort in Key West, Florida. Stay dates are limited to parents only on the dates listed above.
By making your Parents' Annual Fund gift during the first part of the academic year, your dollars will be put to work earlier to benefit your son or daughter and other Fairfield students. The Annual Fund is an integral part of Fairfield's operating budget, targeted to raise $2.9 million this year.
Please make your gift by December 31, 2006, to take advantage of the tax deduction for this calendar year. Gifts of stock are also welcome. Call Fairfield University toll-free at (877) 748-5123 for information on transferring your stock. Check www.fairfield.edu/matchinggifts to see if your employer will match your gift. Matching gifts count towards gift society memberships. You can also make your gift online at www.fairfield.edu/give or by calling (877) 748-5123.
Important Reminders
Financial Aid - March 1, 2007
FAFSA applications and other financial aid documents are due.
Study Abroad - Feb. 1, 2007 / March 15, 2007
Sophomores must file a statement of intent to study abroad their junior year by Feb. 1; contact University College at (203) 254-4332. The study abroad application deadline for fall 2007 for all students is Mar. 15, 2007. On Feb. 19, student notification of an approved semester abroad will be sent for either fall 2007 or spring 2008.
Off-Campus Housing Lottery - Nov. 2006
Fairfield University houses resident students for all four years. Senior and junior residential students interested in being released to off campus housing must enter a lottery in order to be released from their housing contract obligation. Students then must receive a qualifying number. The senior and junior lottery (aka OCB lottery) is held in November. Students should not sign or commit to any leases until they are released from housing. Not everyone is released.
R.A. Application Deadline - Nov. 16 & 29, 2007 / Feb. 9, 2007
Applications will be available at Barone, Room 96 on Nov. 16. For students who are traveling abroad in spring 2007, applications are due on Nov. 29, 2006 for the 2007-08 academic year; all others are due on Feb. 9, 2007.
From the College of Arts and Sciences:
A Q&A with Dr. Robbin Crabtree, Department of Communication
 Surveys from professionals in all fields consistently rank communication skills as the most important factor in hiring and promotion decisions. At Fairfield, the communication major is the University's most popular, graduating approximately 100 students each year or nearly 15 percent of each senior class. Dr. Robbin Crabtree, professor and chair of the Department of Communication, has led the growth of the Department from 3.3 faculty members to eight full-time professors, and offers us the following reflections.
Q. What first attracted you to Fairfield University five years ago?
A. When I was ready to move on from my faculty position at New Mexico State University, I applied to many Jesuit schools for their social justice mission. Becoming a member of the Jesuit higher education community was a way of articulating my own calling as a teacher and researcher. In addition, I believe communication is an integral area of study in the 21st century. While very few elite liberal arts colleges have it as a major, all the Jesuit schools do. The Jesuits have always understood the importance of effective communication, especially across cultures and contexts.
Q. What do you remember about your first day of class at Fairfield?
A. The first course I was scheduled to teach was "Globalization, Media, and Culture," and it was scheduled for the afternoon of Sept. 11, 2001. Naturally, all classes that day were cancelled. When we reconvened a week later, I asked students to make a connection between the course syllabus and the tragic events of that day. As an historical moment in time, 9/11 deepened the experience of the class that year; five years later, it's nearly impossible to have a conversation on globalization without touching on this event.
Q. What's the difference between a major in English and a major in Communication?
A. This is confusing to a lot of people, because these areas have so much in common, and communication has strong interdisciplinary roots. In general, English focuses on the study of literature and writing. Communication is the study of human communication behavior, embracing all ways humans communicate, both verbally and nonverbally, and also includes the study of the mass media and their social impact. A broad liberal arts curriculum allows students to follow whatever career path they choose with either major, or any major - philosophy, art history, politics, and more. Students who get the most of their academic experience simply study what they enjoy studying, and then round out their education through opportunities like internships, international educational exchanges, and community service experiences. It's important to keep in mind that their perfect career fit will come in time, but most likely many years after graduation.
Q. How do you plan to weave the University's new living and learning initiative into your curriculum?
A. It's already there - we'd have a hard time not integrating the lived experience into the learning environment of our students. When I teach family communication, for instance, and we come to issues such as family roles and communication rules, I ask students for examples in their daily lives. Lots of hands go up. Students are welcome to bring their own lives into the classroom not merely to self-disclose, but to reflect on the concepts being taught and to enlighten our understanding as a class. And they very much enjoy making the connection. We integrate conceptual, reflective, and experiential modes of learning in most of our classes, as this is a disciplinary tradition.
Q. This year you'll be finishing up your second term as chair of the Department. What's next for you?
A. I've already begun my new position as director of service learning in the Center for Faith and Public Life. Ever since I took a group of students from another university to El Salvador on a service-learning experience, I've been committed to this form of experiential education - it's a great fit with the Jesuit goal of education for solidarity. At the end of this year, I plan to take a sabbatical leave in order to conduct research in Nicaragua, and maybe in Kenya. My hope is to interact with several communities in the countries where I've had long-term research interests. I'll also probably be working with the Universidad Centroamericana, the Jesuit university in Managua, because Fairfield has a partnership with them. When I return, I'll work half-time in a faculty-teaching role and half-time in the director role.
Q. What are your thoughts for the new chair of the Department of Communication?
A. I'm confident the new chair at Fairfield will find, as I have, a faculty who are fantastic teachers with fascinating research agendas. The faculty in Fairfield's Department of Communication are totally committed to undergraduate education in the liberal arts tradition, as well as to an increasingly dynamic and integrated living-learning environment.
Send-off parties are a long-standing tradition at Fairfield, providing an opportunity for incoming first-year students from the same geographic area and their parents to connect with each other and begin to build relationships before the start of the academic year. Representatives from the Academic, Finance and Administration, Student Affairs, and Advancement divisions attended many of the send-off parties, along with local Parents' Committee members. This past summer, the Parents' Committee recruited 12 families (some of whom are also alumni) from all over the country to host these events at their homes. About 900 people attended the send-offs! Visit http://www.fairfield.edu/parentsfund and click on "Photo Album" for a full list of send-off hosts and a terrific collection of photos. We extend a warm thank you to these hosts for opening their homes to the extended Fairfield family.
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Students and parents living near Syosset, Long Island, enjoyed a send-off at the home of Parents' Committee members John and Lorrie Cherpock P'08. |
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| Terry and Sheila Tedeschi P'10 hosted a send-off at their home in Duxbury, Mass. Alumnus Bill Crean '91 and his wife Amy attended on behalf of the Boston Alumni Association and provided a special Fairfield gift to the attendees. |
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Students and parents pose for a group photo at the send-off hosted at the home of Ernest and Marguerite (Downing '83) Peck P'10, in Rockville Center, New York. |
The Advancement Division of Fairfield University publishes Parent Ties three times a year for parents of undergraduate students. Letters to the editor, address changes, and correspondence should be sent to:
Parent Ties
Bellarmine Hall Room 307
Fairfield University
1073 North Benson Road
Fairfield, CT 06824-5195
e-mail: parentties@mail.fairfield.edu
Editor
Lisa M. Roberts
Editorial Committee
Claudia B. Nielsen
Eileen Bossone
Joe and Joan Maher, P' 07
Clare Schimpf '76
University Photojournalist
Jean Santopatre |
