On Saturday, May 11, the Aquinas College community held the Baccalaureate Mass and Commencement. The Baccalaureate Mass at the Cathedral of the Incarnation, celebrated by Nashville Bishop David R. Choby, was followed by the pinning of the nursing graduates and the awards for outstanding achievement in the Schools of Arts & Sciences, Business, Nursing, and Education. That afternoon, Aquinas College held the Commencement Ceremony at the War Memorial Auditorium in downtown Nashville. Catholic physician Dr. Wes Ely, who specializes in end-of-life care, delivered a moving Commencement address.

Graduate Portraits

Photographs of all of the graduates receiving their degree from Sister Mary Sarah are available below. They are in alphabetical order. To download, click on the picture to make it larger, then right-click (or control-click on a Mac) and choose “save image as…” or “save picture as…” Please feel free to make your own prints.

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All Graduation Pictures

The rest of the pictures from the Baccalaureate Mass are available for browsing and download from our Flickr page.

• Baccalaureate Mass & Graduation Flickr set

If you have a free Flickr account, you may order prints straight from Flickr. You may also download the files individually and print them yourselves.

Reports to: Vice-President for Student Life
Annual Performance Review: Vice-President for Student life
Position: 12 Months

Summary: The Director of Residential life oversees the physical, spiritual and emotional welfare of the residential students and the administration of the House Life System for the College. The Director of Residential Life ensures a vibrant Catholic, Dominican residential life that is central to the experience of Aquinas College.

Key Responsibilities

• Coordinate with the College Chaplain, Campus Minister, Director of Student Affairs, and Heads of Houses to create and sustain a full campus life for both residential and non-residential students
• Work with security, housekeeping, maintenance and food service as it pertains to the residential experience
• Enforce residential life policies
• Oversee Housing for summer workshops and classes
• Work with the faculty Head of House to form students in living a virtuous life as scholars through worship, activities, intramural sports, competitions between the Houses, community service, and the joy of living in community
• Work with Heads of Houses, Residential, and House Assistants to plan and execute the weekly, monthly and yearly events and retreats that mark the liturgical and academic calendar
• Oversee the administration of the Houses, including budgets, liturgical life, traditions and activities, rules and regulations, and whatever pertains to the life of the students living on campus.
• Presides at all major ceremonies associated with the Houses
• Recruit, supervise and evaluate Resident and House Assistants
• Work with Aquinas’ Department of Advancement to promote the Residential House system and secure partnerships with local and national agencies that can benefit student life
• Meets and reports regularly with the Vice President for Student Life

Requirements

• Practicing Catholic
• Commitment to the mission of Aquinas College and to the tradition of the Catholic intellectual tradition in higher education
• Bachelor’s Degree, Master’s Preferred
• Direct experience in Residential or Student Life Program Management
• Proven capacity for teamwork, organization and leadership
• Ability to communicate well, verbally, in writing and through social media
• Ability to use technology and College informational database
• Strong interpersonal skills with a proven capacity for mediation and conflict resolution
• Experience in managing a budget
• Ability to travel and work some nights and weekends for events
• Resides at Seton Lodge (Residential housing)

Send Resume and cover letter to:

Sister Mary Cecilia, O.P.
Vice-President for Student Life
4210 Harding Pike
Nashville, TN 37205
srmcecilia@aquinascollege.edu

Dr. E. Wesley Ely delivered the speech at the 2013 Aquinas College Commencement on Saturday, May 11. Dr. Ely is a medical school professor with a subspecialty in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine. His research has focused on improving the care and outcomes of critically ill patients with sepsis and respiratory failure, with special emphasis on the problems facing older patients in the ICU. A devout Catholic, Dr. Ely has contributed inspirational articles to numerous publications, including the Tennessee Register, and delivered a lecture in the Fall of 2012 entitled “True Devotion to the Blessed Mother.”

Please click on the “CC” icon in the YouTube window for subtitles.

Awards

The awards given to outstanding achievement in the various programs are as follows:

St. Augustine of Hippo Award (School of Arts & Sciences)
Rebecca Marie Thompson

St. Joseph the Worker Award (School of Business)
Anthony Sherman Lena

St. Dominic, Teacher of Truth Award (School of Education)
Christina Ann Cathey

St. Catherine of Siena Award (School of Nursing—Associate of Science in Nursing)
Joshua David Parker and Jessica Rose Schultz

St. Martin de Porres Award (School of Nursing—Bachelor of Science in Nursing)
Jody Marie Boone

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More Information

Please check the Aquinas College website soon for more information and pictures about this year’s Baccalaureate Mass and Commencement.

For some end-of-year fun, the Office of Student Life created a student video contest, asking the question: What Should Every Student at Aquinas Know?

Voting has closed and the winners have been announced:

1st: Get to Class on Time, by Mary Weadon and Therese Youso
2nd: Live a Healthy, Balanced Lifestyle, by Mary Weadon and Therese Youso
3rd: A Quote, by David Maddux

If you aren’t on Facebook, please email communications@aquinascollege.edu and let us know which video you like the best.

We pray for our students who begin their Spring semester examinations today. The Houses will be offering snacks and refreshments in Aquinas Central all week.

We also offer this prayer, composed by our patron St. Thomas Aquinas, that may be helpful before studying, teaching, speaking, or any other activity that involves these faculties. The original prayer in Latin is also provided below.

A Prayer Before Study

Ineffable Creator,
Who, from the treasures of Your wisdom,
have established three hierarchies of angels,
have arrayed them in marvelous order
above the fiery heavens,
and have marshaled the regions
of the universe with such artful skill,

You are proclaimed
the true font of light and wisdom,
and the primal origin
raised high beyond all things.

Pour forth a ray of Your brightness
into the darkened places of my mind;
disperse from my soul
the twofold darkness
into which I was born:
sin and ignorance.

You make eloquent the tongues of infants.
refine my speech
and pour forth upon my lips
The goodness of Your blessing.

Grant to me
keenness of mind,
capacity to remember,
skill in learning,
subtlety to interpret,
and eloquence in speech.

May You
guide the beginning of my work,
direct its progress,
and bring it to completion.

You Who are true God and true Man,
who live and reign, world without end.

Amen.

Ante Studium

Creator ineffabilis,
qui de thesauris sapientiae tuae
tres Angelorum hierarchias designasti,
et eas super caelum empyreum
miro ordine collocasti,
atque universi partes elegantissime disposuisti,

tu inquam qui
verus fons
luminis et sapientiae diceris
ac supereminens principium

infundere digneris
super intellectus mei tenebras
tuae radium claritatis,
duplices in quibus natus sum
a me removens tenebras,
peccatum scilicet et ignorantiam.

Tu, qui linguas infantium facis disertas,
linguam meam erudias
atque in labiis meis gratiam
tuae benedictionis infundas.

Da mihi
intelligendi acumen,
retinendi capacitatem,
addiscendi modum et facilitatem,
interpretandi subtilitatem,
loquendi gratiam copiosam.

Ingressum instruas,
progressum dirigas,
egressum compleas.

Tu, qui es verus Deus et homo,
qui vivis et regnas in saecula saeculorum.

Amen.

The annual Spring Fling took a turn for the medieval at the end of the banner 2012-2013 academic year that saw the introduction of graduate studies and the foundation of Residential Life.

The “Springeth Flingeth” theme roughly coincided with William Shakespeare’s 449th birthday and included turkey legs, minstrels, actors from the Nashville Shakespeare Festival, a House Life tug-o-war competition, and the inaugural AQUAnas Palooza slip-n-slide. Students took the “flingeth” part of the event title literally and constructed a medieval siege machine known as a trebuchet.

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The Write Reason Plan, a student-oriented center that includes the Writing Center and a campus-wide writing rubric, rounded out the busy 2012-2013 academic year with the Writers’ Night Symposium and the publication of the Spring 2013 edition of The Torch.

Writers’ Night

At Writers’ Night on Friday, April 19, students from a variety of courses presented papers on the topics of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, the theological concept of free will, the poetry of English martyr Robert Southwell, the fashion of Marie Antoinette, and Vietnamese Cardinal Nguyen Van Thuan.

Contest proceedings, including full text of the papers may be found on the Writers’ Night page.]

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The Torch

On the Monday following Writers’ Night, the Write Reason Center published the second edition of the student publication the Torch, a collection of reviews on books and essays about the humanities and culture. The Spring 2013 edition features Stephen Lanham on Edward Tick’s War and the Soul, Shannon Martin on Aquinas’ own Sister Matthew Marie and Sister Elizabeth Anne’s Behold the Heritage about Dominican education, Sister Hannah Barnes on Ralph McInerny’s Dante’s Vision of Our Lady, and Pamela Strobel on George Weigel’s Letters to a Young Catholic.

More information about the Torch and to read back issues, please visit the Torch page.

Other Events from the Academic Year

The Write Reason Center presented many other events throughout the year, including the lunch and lectures “Social Media and Your Future” by Dr. Sarah Wannemuehler, “J.R.R. Tolkien and the Christian Imagination” (video included) by Dr. Aaron Urbanczyk and Father Albert Trudel, O.P., and numerous other events and workshops.

Fall registration is now open for returning students at Aquinas College. The fall semester will begin on Monday, August 26. For a full schedule of classes, visit the Class Schedules page or download the schedule below.

• Fall Class Schedule (undergraduate)
• Fall Class Schedule (graduate)

The 2nd Annual Spring Art Exhibition officially opened on Monday, April 15 with the theme of “Transcendent Beauty: the Glory of God Is Man Fully Alive.” The exhibition, sponsored by the Aquinas College Center for Faith & Culture, includes works from faculty, staff, and students from a variety of media. Paintings from Sister Mary Angelica’s recent portrait painting enrichment class comprise three of the entries. Also on display were paintings from the Office of Alumni Relations’ service project working with women at Room in the Inn, “Beauty from the Inside Out.”

The art show will remain in the Carriage House until Friday, April 26.

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The exhibition includes works by these artists:

• Brandon Bell
• Alan Bradley
• Cindy Buss
• Doug Chaney
• Julianna Cheij
• Stephen Delius
• Paul Downey
• Sr. Magdalena Dudenhoeffer, O.P.
• Sr. Mary Angelica Neenan, O.P.
• Sr. Mary Leo Nordmark
• Marianna Rollins
• Julia Smith
• Sr. Anne Timmons

The Aquinas College and Dominican Campus communities gathered on the steps of the White House on the afternoon of Wednesday, March 13 to pray and give thanks for the election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio to the See of Peter as Pope Francis.

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Coverage of Aquinas’ rally:

• New pope expected to connect with youth and Hispanics in TN (WKRN)
• New pope’s simple life impresses Nashville Catholics (Tennessean)
• Local Catholics Gather To Celebrate Election Of New Pope (Channel 5)