Student Engagement This Semester
College Students Love Writing Letters!
(Who would’ve guessed??)
We’ve been setting up a table once a week in one of the large dinning areas on campus with handmade paper, ink wells, and fountain pens and then inviting students to sit down for a moment and write a letter to a friend or family member. Our typical hook is something like “You’ll be your grandma’s favorite grandchild!” To which many respond, “That’s totally true! She’s never received a hand-written letter from me!” In fact, most of them have never written a letter at all!
The fancy paper and pens are nice added touch, but the real fun comes when we hand them an envelope and a stamp. Most college students (at least according to the small sample size that we’ve encountered) have no idea how to address an envelope. And when given the stamp, they often ask “Why do we put a sticker on it?” and “Where do we put it?”
This event has been a blast! It’s a great way to meet students and introduce them to Alcuin Study Center. But more than that, it’s a way of cultivating human flourishing. Like our namesake, Alcuin of York, we are committed to passing down to the next generation all that is good, true, and beautiful. Handwriting is a fading art. The joy of pulling a pen across paper and expressing our hearts to somebody we love, knowing that they will find a treasure in their mailbox, is a good and beautiful thing. Turns out, the students agree!
How Does my Faith Affect my Work?
This semester we’ve been studying the theology of work and vocation through a 7-week class entitled By the Sweat of Our Brow: An Exporation of Work & Vocation. This class began as a collaboration between Alcuin Study Center and the intern program of a campus ministry called The Revolution. Others who joined us include a science professor, a CRU staff member, students from both Ball State and Ivy Tech, and a mother with two very bright young boys. We’ve had some great discussions! I encourage you to check out the videos as we upload them in the coming weeks.
Dr. Allison Barber
of the Indiana Fever
Another event along these lines was the annual Faith @ Work Speaker. This event is hosted by several of the ministries on campus, and this year Alcuin Study Center took the lead in putting it together. About 70 students and faculty turned out for the event! The speaker was Dr. Allison Barber, a remarkable woman whose professional journey has taken her from the Red Cross to the Pentagon to the WNBA’s Indiana Fever—and beyond! Listen to the ways in which her faith in Christ was challenged and strengthened along the way, and learn about her latest endeavor to give underprivileged young women the opportunity to thrive!
So, What’s Your Question?
We’re asking students to share their big questions with us. As we collect a library of honest questions, we will also be responding to those questions, not so much by answering them definitively but by providing a few thoughts, a few resources—and probably more questions—to encourage our inquirers to continue pursuing their answers through study and conversation. We then offer a space and a community in which that research and those discussions can take place.
Follow the link in the description of the YouTube videos to ask your own question!
Alcuin Study Center would not exist if not for the generous contributions of our supporters. If you are not yet among them, please consider a monthly or annual gift. As little as $10 monthly makes an impact.
Thank you for investing in a thoughtful Christian presence at Ball State University!
In Christ, in whom all things hold together,
Dan Daugherty, Executive Director