A Blog on McConnell Center Life

By Harper Hall Warning: Spoilers Ahead I recently finished reading Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins, the newest prequel to The Hunger Games series. In the Hunger Games, child tributes must survive a deadly, televised competition in a controlled arena, where they must fight each other until only one remains alive. I first read The Hunger Games in seventh grade, and my eyes were opened to the world of dystopian literature. Revisiting this series six years later offered me new insights into the country of Panem, allowing me to better understand the purpose of the series. Sunrise on the Reaping is the story of Haymitch Abernathy, a boy from District 12 reaped for the 50th Hunger Games. Readers of the series recognize him from his role as a mentor to Katniss and Peeta in the 74th and 75th Hunger Games, in which he quickly became a fan favorite. Sunrise on the Reaping showcases Haymitch’s experience in the Games, and how he fought against the Capitol every step of the way. Sunrise o...

By Caroline Bergin        Over Christmas, my Mimi took my entire extended family on a vacation to Key West, Florida. It was a great trip and, luckily, it turns out all 25 of us do like each other enough to spend a whole week together! I loved Key West. I loved the roosters crowing in the morning, the little boutiques, the exquisite Cuban coffee, and the gorgeous bakeries, but most of all I loved the atmosphere of the island. Everyone hears about the slow, nonchalant feeling of a beach town, but I had never truly understood what people were talking about until this trip.      I remember going out on a short boat tour after an afternoon of snorkeling. During the tour, we went by a bunch of sailboats anchored offshore. Our guide told us that people lived in those boats full-time. They live without running water, have few possessions, and are in a state of constant movement. These people connect to land with little dingy boats they use to take tri...

By Trey Stephens        The last time I addressed the readers of this blog, I spoke about the little known destination of Little Rock, Arkansas. Today, I bring to you the glories and travel gem that is the Cayman Islands. The Cayman Islands are a semi-autonomous dependency of the United Kingdom, with their own parliament, laws, and culture. For reference, when I say the Cayman Islands, I am referring to the territory as a whole, which includes three islands, Grand Cayman, Cayman Brac, and Little Cayman. Grand Cayman is the specific island that I have experience visiting and will zero in on during this blog post, the Island of which happens to be the most populous of the three and houses the capital city of, George Town.      For starters, Grand Cayman, features some of the best diving in the world, which I was fortunate enough to be able to experience first hand. Specifically, The Caymans are famous for their wall diving, as the Islands thems...

By Leo Tobbe Growing up, I didn’t love sports. I didn’t mind participating in them— I liked being outside and being active, and I’ve been a competitive swimmer for most of my life. I just didn’t like watching sports on TV. My dad always had ESPN on in the mornings, and in elementary school my peers would shout across the lunch table about the March Madness and the NFL playoffs; the conversation failed to appeal to the pre-pubescent political junkie I was back then. Instead of rushing yards and three-point averages, I wanted to talk about Electoral College votes and the Iowa Caucus. CNN was my SportsCenter. In other words, I was an obnoxious nerd in the 5 th  grade, and the world of athletics became symbolic of my struggle to connect with my peers. That perception stayed with me all through middle school, and didn’t really change until my senior year of high school. That summer is when my love affair with baseball started. My dad had left a Dodgers game on, and at that particular mo...

By Connor Price Over the course of the past couple of semesters, I have been seriously exploring the field of philosophy. I took a contemporary moral problems course last semester because I was interested in the field, and it totally captivated me. I enjoyed exploring different moral theories and participating in the discussions and introspective activities we did in class. I especially liked reading ancient philosophy such as Aristotelian virtue ethics and stoicism, but the universal potential for application that Kant’s categorical imperative possessed was very attractive as well. That class inspired me to take a graduate level ethics course this semester where I engage more with primary philosophical texts, and I am now considering adding a philosophy major. This engagement with theory, while fascinating on its own, led me to realize something: I couldn’t outline my own specific moral code, and I took that as a pretty significant issue. I grew up in a household without religion—my p...

By Keely O'Bryan “Prudence is not only the first in rank of the virtues political and moral, but she is the director, the regulator, the standard of them all.” -Edmund Burke “Prudence as well as moral virtue determines the complete performance of a man's proper function: Virtue ensures the rightness of the end we aim at, prudence ensures the rightness of the means we adopt to gain that end.” -Aristotle Many readings I’ve done within the McConnell Center have emphasized the importance of prudence in decision-making, both as an individual and a leader. Prudence is widely defined throughout centuries of literature and philosophy as the ability to make well-informed, just decisions that lead to the best possible outcome. Prudence is not an exact science, and practicing prudence will not lead to perfect decision-making. However, practicing prudence will lead to better decision-making considering an action’s immediate payoff and future implications. Climate change and environmental p...

By Grace Fields This semester I had the pleasure of reading Wendell Berry’s “Hannah Coulter.” After having read another book in Berry’s ‘Port William Series’ titled “Jayber Crow”, I was excited to experience the lives of the people of Port William once again. After reading ‘Jayber Crow’, I fell in love with the inhabitants of Port William; they seem less like characters to me and more like real people now. However, ‘Hannah Coulter’ touched me in ways I did not expect. One of the themes that runs through Berry’s books is the idea of ‘membership’. A ‘membership’ comprises the loved ones that have stood by you, comforted you, and loved you all your life. Hannah describes the membership as being comprised of both the living and the dead. This concept made me reflect on my own membership; the people who have stood by me, comforted me, and loved me unconditionally. Do I recognize the importance of our membership? Do I show love and gratitude towards them? How has my going to colleg...