Bellarmine Magazine Podcast: The Pineapple

You may be surprised to learn that this outstanding Bellarmine University graduate only applied to one college. That one school was Bellarmine University, and, she only went on one college visit to Bellarmine. Dulce Solorio says she'd heard so many wonderful things about the school that she didn't hesitate to apply. She graduated in the class of 2017 with a double major in International Studies and Psychology. Listen to her inspirational story that incudes three international stops that really opened her eyes. 

In this episode we talk with an entertaining and well informed 5th year senior from Shelbyville.  Zach Wiley plays on the Bellarmine University baseball team and looks forward to a career in Environmental Science.  He says he may pursue a graduate degree in Turf Management.  Zach offers helpful time management advice to incoming students and he says the best thing about Bellarmine is the atmosphere. 

Bellarmine University is well known for its Physical Therapy program and each year hundreds of students from around the world compete for the coveted positions in the program.  One of those students is senior Emily who says after a job shadowing experience she decided to apply to the program.  In this conversation she talks about the rigors of working hard to maintain an academic standing that makes for an attractive candidate for the program.  

This senior student, who is a member of the Class of 2019, says all the right things.  He loves the university, he likes the city, he wanted to stay close to home and he says he's made friends for life at Bellarmine University.  But despite all of that good stuff, Brad has a zany side and describes himself as "goofy".  He has a great conversation to share about his transition from high school to college, why he chose to stay close to home and what it means to him to soon be a Bellarmine graduate.  Brad is a Communications-slash-Digital Media major. 

We spoke with a member of the Class of 2019 at Bellarmine University about selecting an academic major.   Senior student Andrew says he entered the university with an academic major that would put him on a career path to earn a lot of money and then one day it hit him, that he was on the wrong path. Andrew shares wisdom from the seat of a college senior who feels confident about his academic choices and his future. 

Bridget Bard is in charge of Interfaith Programming at Bellarmine University, which is part of Campus Ministry.  She spent a lot of her extra curricular time, while studying at Bellarmine, in the Office of Campus Ministry.  Now that she's a full time employee at the university she has started a new event on campus for storytellers.  Once a month, students huddle in one of the conference rooms of one of the residence life buildings and share stories from a common theme. 

This small town native talks about his need to attend a slightly bigger school. So, communication major, Wynn, chose Bellarmine. He says the five-day orientation for first-year students is critical to understanding the college landscape and making friends. Wynn is a self-described introvert but says orientation brought him out of his shell and put him in a cohort with a dozen other honors students who shared interests. 

Think back to how you learned how to read.  Dr. Winn Wheeler is an assistant professor of literacy at Bellarmine and talks about how to teach teachers how to teach reading.  She says there are five processes, including phonics, vocabulary and comprehension.  In this interview, Dr. Wheeler says two commentaries sparked her interest in helping prepare classroom teachers in reading. 

Sonja Wilde deVries is no stranger when it comes to conversations about social justice and especially in the city of Louisville.  In the Spring 2019 course lineup at Bellarmine University (Louisville) Wilde deVries is teaching a course titled, Social Justice in Louisville and explores the social justice movement from three perspectives: racial, immigrant, LGBTQ communities. 

In this episode of The Pineapple we talk with an Indiana native who says she wanted to find a college that was small.  She was looking for a small campus and small class sizes.  Annaleigh, a first year student, says she found what she was looking for in Bellarmine. In this episode Annaleigh offers advice on how to make campus life work to your environment, how to successfully visit a college campus and how to ask for what you need to know from professors.  

Dr. Amy Tudor has been an assistant professor at Bellarmine University for ten years in the English department and more recently has added her direction of the Galileo Community to her responsibilities. In this conversation, Dr. Tudor talks about the unique challenges and issues facing students who are first in their families to attend college. 

Chris Mattingly is teaching a course this semester in his fourth year at Bellarmine University that has students giving the class great reviews even before finishing it. The class is titled, Streets of Grit in American Lit and one of five assigned books is If Beale Street Could Talk by author James Baldwin. Baldwin goes deep and explores many of the societal ills and wills of the day and Professor Mattingly manages to get students to examine the topics in the book while making a deeper connection with the subject matter. 

The Director of the Bellarmine Career Center stops in with great and inspiring information from the Class of 2018.  The report looks at where the graduates are working, who stayed to work in Louisville, salaries and continuing education.  The Director, Lilly Massa McKinley also offers a half semester course in resume writing and interviewing skills that earns students one academic credit and the course is for half a semester. 

Students in a Bellarmine University honors English class visit the home of William Faulkner in Oxford, Mississippi.  Professor Conor Picken, who is an expert on William Faulkner, his writings and the political climate of his day, assigns four of Faulkner's books (As I Lay Dying, Light in August, Sanctuary, Sound and the Fury) and leads the students through the city of Oxford, the homestead of Faulkner and finally to the burial site. 

In the fall 2018, a small class of Bellarmine University honors students signed up for a course titled, William Faulkner and Social Change. Although most of the students were not familiar with Faulkner and/or his writings, the course would not only satisfy an honors requirement but would offer a trip to Mississippi to visit Faulkner's home.  By the end of the fall semester the students not only had a new appreciation for an author who they initially felt was offensive in some of his writings, but they understood the political air that breathed and influenced the author's writing.  

Natasha Begin, Assistant Dean of Students, helped to found a food pantry at Bellarmine University—the Knights Pantry. In this interview, she talks about the steps that were taken to open the pantry, their community partner and how students have received the pantry. Begin also says there are discussions at this time about creating an emergency fund for students who have unforeseen crises in their lives. 

A senior student pauses before her May 2019 graduation to reflect on what she has learned and some of the misconceptions she had when she enrolled into college. For starters, Mariah says some of what her high school teachers told her about college exams proved to be false. She also learned that making friends was not the challenge she'd thought it might be. This biology major plans on taking a year off after graduating, before applying to medical school. 

In this episode of the Slice, we talk with a senior student (Class of 2019) who is an Exercise Science major. Audrey was homeschooled and even before arriving at Bellarmine University had a very busy schedule that included cross country running. She continued the overbooked scheduled in college and finally decided to make some changes and decisions that every current and prospective college student needs to hear about. 

This outstanding senior student of Bellarmine University's class of 2019 has great advice to share when it comes to selecting courses and how to get along with your roommate.  In Marygrace's case it's plural.  She lived with nine roommates and they are all still good friends.  She helps guide and counsel prospective college students in this interview about knowing when to drop a course and then answers the question, "What's the best thing about Bellarmine," or in other words, "Why Bellarmine?"

Meet Amandarae who says even an American writer she wasn't crazy about could be given a second chance at Bellarmine University. She is one of a dozen Honors English students in a course on William Faulkner and Social Change. She admits she wasn't a big fan of the author the first time around in high school, but thanks to an excellent professor at Bellarmine who taught the course, she has a new perspective.