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Johnny Chestnut Jr. ’11
Major: Francophone Studies
Hometown: Binghamton, N.Y.
Favorite Course: French Encounters
Internship
M
y favorite course at SLU was
not “at” SLU, but an internship
I did as part of my studies in
France. We spoke with our advisor about
our interests and he went out into the
city and found us placements. I ended up
working with an organization called
Restaurants du Cœur, a French
charity that assists homeless and
poverty-stricken people. I encoun-
tered many tired and worn people
looking for a scrap of food, but also
the benevolent people working
hard every day, trying to meet
their needs.
I had only one assignment
for the course: to think and
write about what I saw. I was to
learn people’s stories and develop
an understanding of who they
were, instead of just grouping
everyone under a term like
“homeless.” I would lie in bed
every night and ask myself,
how does this happen, how I
can I make this better, and what would I
do were I in such a situation? And I still
do to this day.
Beth Spadaccini ’11
Major: English
Hometown: Waddington, N.Y.
Favorite Course: Introduction to
Newswriting
I
grew up in a sports-oriented house-
hold. My sister and I were both
dual-sport athletes, Sundays were for
football, Sports Center was a morning
ritual, and at 11 or 12 years old I thought
ESPN’s show “Dream Job”, a competition
for potential sportscasters, pretty much
summed up my life.
I had always wanted to be a broadcaster,
but for some reason when I switched gears
from high school to St. Lawrence the idea
of journalism never entered my mind.
Afer bouncing from a pre-med to a his-
tory concentration and back to undecided,
I fnally found my niche as a sophomore
when, to fll a distribution requirement, I
enrolled in Introduction to Newswriting
with Prof. Kerry Grant.
Prior to this course, I had been expected
in my college writing to follow the same
rules in regards to format, sentence struc-
ture, use of quoted material and so on.
Journalism was a completely diferent type
of writing, centered on a strong lead and
based purely on fact. Journalism relies on
interviews, not just research.
Tough it was originally hard to juggle
the two diferent writing styles across
12 F
ALL
2011
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AWRENCE
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NIVERSITY
M
AGAZINE
My
Favorite
Course
We can all look back and
identify our favorite course
in college. Perhaps we liked
the professor, or the material,
or the setting, or the time of
day, or each other. We asked
several students who were on
campus last year to identify
theirs, and got a few alumni
to chime in too. What was
yours? Why?
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