A Blog on McConnell Center Life

I still can't believe this is my last semester in my undergraduate career. In these next 3 months I will be taking the GRE, writing many graduate school entrance essays, requesting a handful of recommendation letters, keepi ng my grades up in all of my classes, planning different on campus events, and doing lots of praying hoping things all come together! After undergraduate I plan on going to graduate school to earn my masters in Criminal Justice; meanwhile, this semester I a m also focusing on graduating with Magna Cum Laude honors. It would be an understatement to say that I will be busy this semester, please, wish me luck! - Alex Jenkins, Class of 2012

I am coming to the end of my time as a McConnell Scholar, which has prompted some reflection on my part. The last four years have been great, and I have had some amazing opportunities come my way. I've had the opportunity to meet Chief Justice John Roberts, Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Speaker of the House John Boehner, Senator Scott Brown, Senator John McCain, and, of course, Senator Mitch McConnell. My time spent in China this past summer will always be a highlight of my life. However, there will be time later for reflection. Now I must focus on the future. Like Ben S., I am working on my undergraduate Senior Honors Thesis. I have also applied to a number of law schools, and I have been accepted to two so far. I would advise anyone looking to apply to law school in the future to apply early. It is a load off your mind when all your applications are submitted and the decision then is out of your hands. I know I speak for most of the Class o...

Associate Justice Joseph Story As my final semester approaches as an undergraduate at the University of Louisville, I am in the midst of working on what ought to be my crowning academic achievement: completing an undergraduate thesis. A brief excerpt is below: “Decided by the Supreme Court of the United States twenty years before the Civil War, Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842) uniquely encompassed a clash of state and federal law on the issue of fugitive slaves. In light of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793, Associate Justice Joseph Story overturned a Pennsylvania law barring the forcible extradition of fugitive slaves to the state from whence they fled. While its contemporaries decried the decision’s apparent appeasement of Southern interests and its distortion of historical fact, Joseph Story’s majority opinion unintentionally undermined the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793; for, though Story held the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 as constitutional, he did not require states...

Over Christmas break, fellow Senior McConnell Scholar John Weber and I made a great pilgrimage. We took a dream to a reality and had an opportunity to see things from our literary imagination in person. Our imaginations and realities became blurred when we traveled into a fictional world that has become a popular destination for nearly all of our literary generation... We traveled to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. The park, housed in Universal Studio ’ s Islands of Adventure, is a scene right out of the world of Harry Potter. Snow capped buildings greet you as you enter Hogsmeade and the Hogwarts Express billows smoke just to your right. Many of the shops that have become a staple in Harry Potter lore are there as well. Even the iconic Three Broomsticks pub is present. While we were there, we even had the opportunity to try out “ Butterbeer. ” As we were walking through the streets of Hogsmeade, we noticed a shop window adorned with “ J. Pippin ’ s Potions. ” I was caught ...

On January 23, the McConnell Center hosted Martin Cothran from Memoria Press. With a strong interest in classical education, he persuaded several scholars to think about their own education. Much of modern day rhetoric tells us “What to think and what to do” over the classical style “How to think and how to do”. Cothran stated in order to get a classical education, that he recommended us to study logic and latin. Both of which are mathematical in nature and structured. Martin Cothran went on to talk about rhetoric, which he stated meant to teach, to delight, and to move. He lectured on Aristotle, the theoretician, on Quintilian, the teacher, and Cicero, the practitioner. He discussed how Aristotle brought a much better light on rhetoric, than did Plato. Plato believed that rhetoric was unethical because it manipulated emotions. One of the fun points of the night was examining the 3 modes of persuasion including logos, ethos, and pathos which has direct correlation to the 3 elements o...

Spoiler alert: If you have not completed The Lord of the Rings , this post may reveal plotlines yet unknown. For years I admired J.R. R. Tolkien's ability to intrigue my imagination and entertain me. In The Hobbit , he captivated my greedy instincts with tales of treasure. In The Lord of the Rings , Tolkien charmed my conscious with the ultimate triumph of good over evil. For these efforts I was entertained, but never challenged or inspired. Until now. Upon re-reading The Lord of the Rings I became fascinated with the weaving of the story. In popular mysteries/thrillers, plots come together with ease and understanding. Because the action occurs in the real world, everything must make sense. Though the imagination is stirred, it remains confined by the bounds of our world. Though the plot twists and turns, it does so for the purpose of entertaining us. Tolkien took an alternative approach. Instead of entertaining the reader, Tolkien inspires him. Where contem...

This semester is about to be the highlight of my McConnell Scholar career. Over winter break, I had the opportunity to read all three books in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings series. In the next few months, I will have the opportunity to participate in many seminars and lectures regarding my readings. If you asked me before winter break what I thought of the books, I would have told you that I was not too thrilled to read them. Luckily though, after actually reading the books, my opinion has changed. Tolkien writes in a way that is unlike any other author. Not only does he create an entirely different world from our own and explain it in detail, he also keeps readers interested. I advise you to set aside a large portion of your time before beginning his books. If you are anything like me, you will not want to look up from reading. In this blog post in particular, I want to focus on the meaning of friendship in the first book, The Fellowship of the Ring . I...