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Three Great Books students were able to participate in unique academic and hands-on learning programs this summer thanks to funding from the new Cornell Academic Enhancement Fund. 

The fund—a generous gift from the family of the late STU Great Books and English professor Dr. Christine Cornell—supports Great Books students in pursuing co-curricular opportunities like conferences, workshops, and language study seminars. Students Kensea Aaron, Kasey Goodine, and Hayden Keizer were the first beneficiaries of the fund, pursuing summer programs that allowed them to be fully immersed in politics, philosophy, and history. 

 

Kensea Aaron - Hertog Political Studies Program  

Kensea Aaron was selected for the prestigious Hertog Political Studies Program in Washington, DC, where he spent six weeks studying political philosophy, political theory, and public policy. 

“The experience was incredible. We would read about the Declaration of Independence in the morning—both the document itself and John Trumbull’s painting—and then see the real thing in the afternoon,” said Aaron. 

The program combined morning seminars with guest lectures, networking events, and visits to museums and historic sites throughout the city. 

As the only Canadian in a cohort that included students from institutions such as Stanford and Boston College, he initially found the experience intimidating. Once seminars began, however, his experience at STU helped him feel at home. 

“I realized that the small, interactive classes at STU—and in the Great Books Program particularly—had prepared me perfectly for this setting,” he said. 

“The experience made me interested in becoming more politically involved and excited to consider how my work in philosophy can grow into advocacy.”

 

Kasey Goodine - Summer Study Abroad in Taiwan Program

Fourth-year Great Books and Interdisciplinary Studies student Kasey Goodine was fully immersed in the texts, history, and politics of the city of Taipei through the American Core Texts Association’s Summer Study Abroad in Taiwan program. 

The month-long program challenges students to treat the city of Taipei as a text, combining lived experience with intensive Buddhist text curriculum. Goodine and his peers from across the United States visited Confucian and Daoist temples, Taiwanese historic sites, and participated in monastic immersion following the schedule of a Buddhist nunnery. 

“By reading these Buddhist texts that informed how Taiwanese people lived, ate, and walked around their city and established routines, we could understand Taipei as a city in a way that you never could by hearing or reading about it,” Goodine said. 

“To be able to take my learning to the opposite end of the world and have genuine conversations with someone despite a language and culture gap, and close those gaps through my learning, was an incredible experience.”

STU Great Books professor Dr. Matt Dinan encouraged Goodine to pursue this opportunity—one that wouldn’t have been possible without the Cornell Academic Enhancement Fund. 

“Funding from the Cornell Academic Enhancement fund made this a possibility for me. It wouldn’t be right in my mind to avoid mentioning how much this was a key factor in my ability to participate in this program.”

 

Hayden Keizer - Cassiciacum on Manitoulin Summer Humanities Program

Fourth-year student Hayden Keizer spent three-weeks combining rigorous academic study with hands-on permaculture work through the Cassiciacum on Manitoulin Summer Humanities program this summer.

The program aims to create an alternative space for humanistic study that is grounded in practice and community. The theme of the course was friendship in crisis, and for Keizer it demonstrated the importance of collaborative effort in building relationships. 

“I developed an almost instant kinship with those around me simply by sharing the same space, working toward the same ends, and eating together,” Keizer said.  “I overlooked the necessity of linking philosophy with physical actions. Linking active work and adopting a mentality of service to the community really helped in developing discussion around friendship.”

The Political Science and Great Books major is eager to see how his experience in the Cassiciacum on Manitoulin program impacts his final year of study at STU. 

“The reading materials ranging from philosophy, theology, and political science have definitely expanded my knowledge base,” Keizer said. “I’m also going to try and incorporate more physical activity into my work routine. I’m not sure what that will look like right now, but I look forward to figuring it out.”