In a little under a month, Siena Heights University will proudly host the inaugural Scholarship Symposium. The event was developed by Assistant Professor of English Julie Barst. The purpose of the event is to showcase the scholarship of the graduating seniors. Several juniors will also be participating. The students will be presenting their senior projects.

The event is Wednesday, April 8. It will be from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.  It starts in Francoeur Theatre with the keynote speaker in the morning. The various sessions will be in Dominican Hall, classrooms or in Benincasa Hall. The art students will also be presenting two sessions in the afternoon in Studio Angelico. Students will be able to choose which sessions they would like to attend.

“The day will be set up like Common Dialogue Day. There will be various breakout sessions in different locations around campus. The sessions will consist of various types of individual presentations, panel discussions and interdisciplinary poster sessions,” Barst said. The symposium is expected to have around 150 participants.

Barst explained that the idea was originally conceived in an Institutional Review Board meeting. Once the idea came about, it just kept growing. Several SHU English faculty members wanted to have an event similar to ones they had done at their own small, liberal arts schools.

“We felt this would be an amazing opportunity for our students to have. We have our senior project nights; almost every program has something where the seniors present their work at the end. But we thought it would be such a fantastic opportunity for the entire campus, not just our students, to be able to see the work our students are completing in one day and in just a few concentrated spots around campus,” Barst continued.

The main focus of the day is to have the campus come together as a community and celebrate everything the graduating seniors have accomplished. The keynote speaker will bring together the many disciplines on campus through dissent, the First Amendment in the 21st century and also the importance of research in regards to questioning authority and power relations.

Barst stated, “We think the keynote speaker will energize everybody, and then the rest of the day will be a celebration of everything our students have done.”

When asked about the ultimate impact of the Symposium, Barst concluded, “We hope it becomes a tradition just like Common Dialogue Day, so we would have Common Dialogue Day in the fall, and then every winter semester, we would have a scholarship symposium. Our ultimate hope is to highlight all the amazing work our students are doing; that’s the main focus of the day. We want the entire campus to come together as a community and celebrate what our graduating seniors have done with their time at SHU and what they’ve been able to accomplish in their scholarly pursuits. We think it will be an amazing event for our campus. ”