Anna Maria sharing its mission, values with whole college community

By Tanya Connor
The Catholic Free Press
Teaching today’s generation the art of conversation was part of the conversation at the inauguration of Anna Maria College’s speaker series about the Catholic Intellectual Tradition.
The “i-Generation” (people born between 1995 and 2012) has been characterized in part by a focus on iPhones instead of conversations, Joseph T. Kelley said in his lecture “i-Gen, you-Gen, we-all-Gen: How Catholic Higher Education Can Empower Students Today.” A professor in religious and theological studies at Merrimack College, he spoke, earlier this month, of helping students discover their voice through conversation, thus preparing them to enter the public discourse.
Professor Kelley told listeners, including students and college staff, that his charge was to invite them into a conversation about what it means to be a Catholic college today.
He spoke about the founding of Catholic colleges and told listeners, “You are members of a college that is part of a large, influential group in the United States. What sets us apart today? How do those founding principles guide us?”
His PowerPoint presentation listed the principals of Catholic higher education:
– to exercise the Church’s role as a participant in public intellectual discourse and present the Church’s teachings on important topics;
– to promote opportunities for the integration of faith and reason;
– to explore the ethical dimensions of relationships, professions and citizenship for the development of the human family and a new humanism;
– to encourage research and advocacy about ecological responsibility;
– to build community among all members of the college.
“As a Catholic college you play” an important role in discourse about issues of social justice and the right to life in central Massachusetts, Professor Kelley told listeners. “I suspect your professional programs here … emphasize ethics.” He asked professors how they teach differently because they teach at a Catholic college.
He maintained that the founding principles of Catholic higher education can equip “us” to serve the needs of “iGen’ers” and learn from them. He focused on doing this in various areas, including  commitment and conversation.
He said characteristics which author Jean Twenge found typical of iGen’ers (most undergraduates) include: being emotionally fragile, neither “spiritual” nor “religious,” non-judgemental and having poor social skills due to focus on iPhones instead of conversations.
Professor Kelley said St. Augustine of Hippo spoke of a creative tension between intellectual inquiry and religious commitment and called faith “thinking with assent.”
“We can model the art of conversation for our students,” Professor Kelley said, addressing another area where higher education can help students. He spoke of “tutoring iGen’ers and ourselves to prepare them to enter public discourse” and said, “we can help them to discover their voice” in conversation. And they have much to teach “us” by their tolerance.
Liberal arts courses are sometimes sacrificed today because of the cost of higher education and the concern about training students for a career, but Professor Kelley said iGen’ers respond well to philosophy and theology courses that challenge them to read, write and discuss and invite them to reflect on the classics.
He quoted Maya Angelou saying people will forget what you said and did, but not how you made them feel. Professor Kelley said people will remember the love, and he thinks that is the value of a Catholic education.
During the question-and-answer period Allison Uccello, who has teenaged and young adult sons, said, “I’ve come back to school.… The conversations are very different.… People from different perspectives… How do we talk to each other – as a mother and in education?” She said she wishes her younger classmates would talk more; some have wonderful things to say.
“Students often are afraid of being wrong,” Professor Kelley responded. If they’ve read an assignment they’ll talk.
He said rules of conversation he’d shared from David Tracy’s “Plurality and Ambiguity” might help. These called for saying only what you mean, listening respectfully to others, and being willing to defend your opinions and change your mind if the evidence suggests that.
Mary Louise Retelle, Anna Maria’s president,  asked how a college’s Catholic identity will move forward, with few Catholics there.
Professor Kelley said a distinctive contribution Catholic colleges can make to society is asking, “What does it mean to be a human being in relation to other human beings?” as Pope Benedict XVI asked.
Professor Kelley’s talk was part of what Anna Maria’s mission committee is trying to do, said Sister Rollande Quintal, a Sister of St. Anne and founding dean of mission integration.
The committee is trying to help the whole college community share the college’s mission and values, and the charism of the foundresses, the Sisters of St. Anne, said committee member Marc Tumeinski, assistant professor of theology. Sessions have been held to help faculty members incorporate the mission and values into their teaching, he said.
Other talks in the speaker series, which is open to the public, are to address the values of liberal arts, service to community, justice and peace, development of the whole person, cultivation of personal moral responsibility, and diversity and inclusion.