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HONORS

TATTOOS ON THE HEART

Working in the heart of the Los Angeles gang community, Father Gregory Boyle gains a new perspective on life by serving a population that many people don't think about.  This essay talks about Boyle's alternative definition of "success" in light of the work that he does at Homeboy Industries.

ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE

Although the title of this book by Robert Pirsig includes the phrase "motorcyle maintenance", it's really about Pirsig's meditations while riding that motorcycle.  In this essay, Quinn talks about what ideas about university education and the life of the mind compelled her the most in the novel.

VALUE OF LIFE EXPERIENCE VS. EDUCATION

Students traditionally go to college in the fall after they graduate from high school, but is that really the best decision?  This essay is a conversation between Mark Shorris and Anton Chekhov about the pros and cons of attending college the year after high school graduation and "taking a year off".

DESECRATING SANCTUARIES

There are many people that contend that a university education isn't all that it could be, and many have ideas about how it could change.  This essay is about the differences and similarities between Virginia Woolf's and Matthew Arnold's approaches in trying to change that university system.

QUINN'S CHANGING IDEA OF A UNIVERSITY

The jump between high school and college is a large one, and nothing can really prepare you for the reality of college.  In this short blurb, written in the middle of Quinn's first semester as an undergraduate student, she talks about what her newly-formed idea of a university is.

THE VALUE OF A RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

We all know that private schools are more expensive, but is that difference worth it, even when the private school is religious? In this essay, Quinn explores the difference in value between attending a secular state college and a private, religiously-afffiliated school.

BEING ALONE, BUT FAR FROM

BEING LONELY

This piece was the last essay that Quinn wrote for her first semester in the Honors program.  In it, she talks about making the transition from high school to college and her most memorable transition moment.  The photo on the left was taken the day she visited Lowell Pond.

This was the first major essay that Quinn wrote in the second semester of her freshman year.  In it, she talks about what role tradition should take in living well, as well as what the role of innovation ought to be.

THE IMPORTANCE OF LEADING A BALANCED LIFE

One of the main differences between Jesuit universities and other universities is the Jesuit focus on justice, which spreads into the classrooms of Jesuit universities.  In this essay, Quinn explores how students at Jesuit universities can both learn about justice effectively and live out those ideas.

LEARNING ABOUT JUSTICE AT THE JESUIT UNIVERSITY

LISTENING AND LIVING WELL

We all know that listening to people with different perspectives

can be a difficult task.  In this essay, Quinn discusses her ideas on how listening to others can help us all to live harmoniously together.

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