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| Meeting U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell when I first joined the McConnell Scholars Program |
The McConnell Program has three core principles that it encourages its scholars to demonstrate: Scholarship, Leadership, and Service. Through the McConnell Program, I have been given many opportunities to develop my skills in these three areas and to make myself a more well-rounded human being. The McConnell Center has helped me to achieve a diverse educational experience this year, and it has made me a more inquisitive individual. I have read and attended seminars on books such as Ballad of the White Horse by G.K. Chesterton, The Four Quartets by T.S. Elliot, The History of Rasselas by Samuel Johnson, The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkein, and Greatness by Steven F. Heyward as a part of our America’s British Culture ELO. These are works that I may have never found on my own and definitely not as an 18-year-old college freshman. By reading and discussing these classics, I feel like I got a lot more out of my freshman year education. Scholarship is also about having experiences and seeing the world, and the McConnell Program has encouraged me to get out and experience it. Through the McConnell Center Programming, I have been to Williamsburg, Washington D.C., Frankfort, and Mammoth Cave. These places were all new to me, and they were trips and experiences that I will not soon forget.
The McConnell Center encourages its students to be leaders as well as scholars, and the other McConnell Scholars whom I have met this year have challenged and helped me to become a leader on campus. Through meeting individuals such as Student Body President and McConnell Scholar Kurtis Frizzell, I got involved with the University of Louisville Student Government Association and worked on staff this year. I joined Kappa Sigma Fraternity (a Greek organization that some of the older scholars are also a part of) in the fall and have been active as a leader serving as Alumni Relations Chairman and Social Chairman this semester. This spring I was elected to the Fraternity’s Executive Council, and I will be serving as a leader in that capacity next academic year. The McConnell Center also offers opportunities for its scholars to hold leadership roles inside our organization, and I had the chance to serve on the McConnell Scholars Outreach Team, a position that I greatly enjoyed.
The final core principle of the McConnell Center is service, and I have completed 25 service hours within the McConnell Center this academic year. The Center offers its scholars many diverse opportunities to do service in the community, and this year alone, I have served at organizations such as Kentucky Refugee Ministries, Ronald McDonald House, the American Center, Operation Brightside Neighborhood Clean-Up, and Dawson Orman Elementary School. It is important to remember that all leaders must also serve, and the McConnell Center strives to remind its scholars and community about this fact.
In sum, I have had a wonderful year as a freshman McConnell Scholar at the University of Louisville. The Center and the university have offered me many opportunities and have helped me grow a tremendous amount as a person. As excited as I am for the summer, I am equally excited to see what surprises my sophomore year will hold.
- Sam Whittaker, Class of 2015