Boston College Chronicle

The Boston College

Chronicle Published by the Boston College Office of News & Public Affairs december 12, 2013 vol. 22 no. 8

•BC alums take part in Wreaths Across America, page 2

•Grant helps faculty member offer holiday cheer, page 2 •New group on campus sustainability formed, page 2 •Dias is new head of Montserrat Coalition, page 3

•BCPD’s Postell to receive award, page 3 •Eagles to play in bowl on Dec. 31, page 3 •CSOM faculty mull impact of touchscreens, page 4 •Muldoons share guidelines for family spirituality, page 5

•BC to host Poe’s 205th birthday event, page 5 •Nobel laureate among speakers at economics conference, page 5 •McLaughlin to retire after 52 years on faculty, page 6

SESQUICENTENNIAL MOMENTS, IN WORDS AND PICTURES Boston College will formally close out its Sesquicentennial commemoration this afternoon, when University President William P. Leahy, SJ, celebrates a Mass that will coincide with the annual baccalaureate ceremony for seniors who have completed their undergraduate requirements. All members of the University community are invited to the Mass, which takes take place at 4 p.m. in St. Ignatius Church.

The Sesquicentennial was an occasion for BC to celebrate 150 years of tradition, legacy and growth, but also an opportunity to consider the University’s mission and role as a distinctive Jesuit, Catholic institution of higher learning in the larger world.

Sesquicentennial events included the Mass of the Holy Spirit at Fenway Park, a special concert at Symphony Hall, a Founders Day celebration, a convocation that featured Harvard University President Drew Gilpin Faust as keynote speaker, and a program of symposia on a number of societal concerns. [Information on Sesquicentennial events, programs and activities is available at www. bc.edu/150.]

Chronicle invited members of the Boston College community to share their favorite moments from the Sesquicentennial. To read the full version, see www.bc.edu/ chronicle.

THE

Sesquicentennial Gary Gilbert

Leo Sullivan, the long-serving vice president for human resources, has announced that he will step down this spring and transition to a new role as senior advisor to the president.

University President William P. Leahy, SJ, said that Sullivan will remain as vice president for huLee Pellegrini

Sept. 15, 2012: Sesquicentennial Mass at Fenway Park “The naturalization ceremony held in Robsham Theater in March was a tremendous moment, a very moving event: Boston College, founded 150 years ago to educate the sons of immigrant parents, welcomed men and women of many lands and cultures who were received as new American citizens. This was a moment of community, for the stories of each of those new citizens truly blessed this ground we call BC.”

Lee Pellegrini

Human Resources VP Leo Sullivan

—University Secretary and Vice President Terrence Devino, SJ “One of the most memorable experiences at the Fenway Park Mass was when I was queuing up to get the hosts for Communion. I remember walking onto the field and looking behind me to see all of the people in the stands. It was absolutely breathtaking. It was overwhelming to see the amount of people who share that love for and devotion to Boston Col-

Oct. 10, 2012: Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust Continued on page 4 speaks at Robsham Theater

Andre Williams prepares to graduate from BC, having succeeded in the classroom as well as on the football field

By Reid Oslin Special to the Chronicle

•MBA business plan competition, page 6

Andre Williams is a record-setting football hero and a bona fide Renaissance Man who likens his Boston College experience to reading a good book.

“Sometimes you are just turning a page at a time and you can’t see the whole story,” says the soft-

Sullivan to Step Down, Take New Role

By Jack Dunn Director of News & Public Affairs

A Story with ‘A Fantastic Ending’

•Obituary: David Smith of Counseling Services, page 6

•Women’s soccer on upswing, page 8

Celebrating

spoken Lynch School of Education senior, who just happens to be the leading rusher in college football this year. “But in the end, there is a fantastic ending.

“I think my career at BC has had a fantastic ending.”

Williams won’t get much argument on that fact. Not only did he run for 2,102 yards this fall – shattering all BC rushing records and

QUOTE:

man resources until his successor is named, likely in three to four months, at which time he will assume his new role as presidential advisor.

“Leo has had such a profound influence on the life and culture of Boston College,” said Fr. Leahy.

“He has provided pastoral care, wisdom and sensitivity throughout his decades of service. I am pleased Continued on page 3

Lee Pellegrini

INSIDE

posting the ninth-best individual season in the history of college football — but he has been a stellar performer in the classroom as well.

He was chosen as a teaching assistant in a one-semester freshman core course, The Courage to Know, that is geared to help new students transition into college life.

The LSOE human developContinued on page 8 Andre Williams

“Parenting is already an act of faith. You don’t know what kind of person your kid will grow up to be. Everything you do is guesswork on some level. Every decision as a parent is predicated on faith.”

—Tim Muldoon, assistant to the vice president for University Mission and Ministry, page 5

T he B oston C ollege

Chronicle december 12, 2013

2

A ROUND

C AMPUS

BC AND HC TEAMING UP TO REMEMBER THOSE WHO SERVED A group of Washington, DCarea Boston College graduates will join with their College of the Holy Cross counterparts this Saturday to honor alumni veterans buried in Arlington National Cemetery, as part of the annual Wreaths Across America event.

For two decades, Wreaths Across America — organized by a national non-profit of the same name — has encouraged people to take time during the holiday season to recognize the sacrifices of veterans and their families. Volunteers lay holiday wreaths at Arlington as well as veterans’ cemeteries and other locations in all 50 states and beyond. Wreaths Across America also sponsors a week of events including international veterans tributes, ceremonies at state houses and a weeklong “Veteran’s Parade” between Maine and Virginia.

Four years ago, Brian Cummins ’82, a retired US Army lieutenant colonel, recruited members of the BC alumni chapter in Washington to lay wreaths at the graves of BC alumni interred in Arlington dur-

Washington, DC-area alumni visit the graves of fellow BC graduates as part of the Wreaths Across America event. (Photo courtesy of Brian Cummins)

ing Wreaths Across America Day. “BC has an outstanding tradition of ‘citizen-soldier’ military service to our great republic,” says Cummins. “I wondered how many

people buried at Arlington have BC connections, and I got in touch with BC grads in the DC area to see if we could find out and honor them for Wreaths Across

REACHING OUT FOR THE HOLIDAYS A decade ago, Communication to the kids in Chinle, and provide additional 20 that we donated to be Assistant Professor of the Practice an opportunity to get to know her given individually.”

Wells says her project was Celeste Wells began working aided considerably through a with a support organization for Kolvenbach Grant from the Native American elders. This Intersections program in the year, she decided to extend a University Mission and Minlittle holiday cheer to the elistry division. These grants of ders’ grandchildren, and got up to $1,000 encourage faculty some Boston College students engagement with students on to help her. issues surrounding social jusThe Utah-based organitice. “The grant was instruzation Adopt a Native Elder mental. The project cost about (ANE) provides resources such $475, and I would have had as food, medicines, yarn and difficulty putting it together firewood that enable Dine’ (Navajo) elders to follow their Celeste Wells and her students made holiday stockings without the funds. The Intercultural and spiritual tradi- for Native American children. (Photo by Celeste Wells) sections program administrations, according to Wells, who students a little better. She reached tors and staff are absolutely fantashas frequently donated goods and out to her classes and advisees for tic.”

And, yes, Wells is definitely supplies. Then, earlier this fall, she volunteers to help her make the found out ANE wanted to organize stockings, which had to be delivered thinking about doing the project next year – “this time starting earlier a holiday stocking celebration for to ANE by Nov. 1.

“I had a number that were very so I can plan around midterms and the elders’ grandchildren at a school in the Chinle Unified District of interested,” she says, “but because thus increase students’ ability to northeast Arizona — where the me- we had to do the activity on a Sat- participate,” she adds.

—Sean Smith dian household income for families urday during midterms and it took [For more on the Kolvenbach about five hours, five students were is $20,161.

Wells felt a project to create able to be part of the event. We Grant program, see www.bc.edu/ holiday stockings could serve two made 24 stockings for a full class- content/bc/offices/intersections/Kolvenpurposes: bring a little happiness room of students and then made an bach.htm] Director of NEWS & Public Affairs Jack Dunn Deputy Director of NEWS & Public AFFAIRS Patricia Delaney Editor Sean Smith

Contributing Staff Melissa Beecher Ed Hayward Sean Hennessey Rosanne Pellegrini Kathleen Sullivan Michael Maloney Photographers Gary Gilbert Lee Pellegrini

The Boston College

Chronicle www.bc.edu/chronicle chronicle@bc.edu

America.”

This year, encouraged by retired US Navy Chaplain Robert K. Keane, SJ ’71 — an administrator at Holy Cross who was the keynote speaker at BC’s Veterans Day ceremony last month — Holy Cross alumni in the DC area decided to link up with Cummins and the other BC grads to visit Arlington for Wreaths Across America Day. But it’s no simple task to ascertain the location of a grave of a BC or Holy Cross veteran, Cummins says: “There are no records that tell you what college the deceased attended. So we mainly rely on word of mouth, from family or friends who tell us where someone from BC is buried, or web searches.”

Thus far, Cummins and his fellow alumni have honored 20 BC veterans at Arlington on Wreaths Across America day, including 1898 graduate Lt. General Hugh Drum, namesake of Fort Drum in upstate New York.

“Each year, we hear about a new location to visit — sometimes relatives are unable to make the

trip and they’ll ask us to go on their behalf,” he says. “When we lay a wreath on a grave, we’ll say the prayer of St. Ignatius, and put a BC banner next to the wreath and take a photo. We’ll e-mail the photo to family who are unable to attend. That’s who we do this for, after all.”

Cummins says the addition of Holy Cross alumni this year will make the event even more meaningful. The two institutions share many characteristics, he says, including some forged in tragedy: During Wreaths Across America Day in 2011, he met a BC alumna who had traveled to place a wreath on the grave of her boyfriend, a Holy Cross grad and Navy veteran who had died in a plane crash many years ago.

“BC and Holy Cross are historically described as ‘rival Catholic schools,’ but there are far more things which bind us than separate us. We’re very happy to join hands in fellowship and honor our departed alumni veterans.”

—Sean Smith

A newly formed group representing a wide cross-section of the University community aims to foster more collaboration and communication about Boston College’s sustainability programs.

Last month saw the inaugural meeting of the Cross-Functional Sustainability Advisory Group, attended by representatives from such offices, departments and campus organizations as Dining Services, Procurement, Information Technology Services, Transportation and Parking, Eco Pledge, Alumni Association, Greener Lib, Facilities Services, Engineering and Energy Management, Volunteer Services and University Mission and Ministry.

“Once we introduced ourselves, we all provided a sampling of the type of ‘green’-oriented initiatives and activities in the areas where we work – recycling programs, water and energy conservation measures, promoting alternative transportation, and many other examples,” said Sustainability Program Director Robert Pion, who chairs the group. “We want to inventory the range of these programs, assess how they’re working now and what we can do – individually and collectively – to make them work better.

“Most of all, we’ll be talking about how we can spread the word about sustainability efforts in the wider University community, so people know they can play a role in making BC a greener university,” added Pion, who said the group’s next meeting is slated for February.

For information on sustainability at Boston College, see www. bc.edu/sustainability.

—Office of News & Public Affairs

The Boston College Chronicle (USPS 009491), the internal newspaper for faculty and staff, is published biweekly from September to May by Boston College, with editorial offices at the Office of News & Public Affairs, 14 Mayflower Road, Chestnut Hill, MA 02467 (617)552-3350. Distributed free to faculty and staff offices and other locations on campus.

Periodicals postage paid at Boston, MA and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: send address changes to The Boston College Chronicle, Office of News & Public Affairs, 14 Mayflower Road, Chestnut Hill, MA 02467.

A flipbook edition of Chronicle is available via e-mail. Send requests to chronicle@bc.edu.

T he B oston C ollege

Chronicle december 12, 2013

3

BC Graduate Dias Is Named Head of Montserrat Coalition “I remember the choices I had to make as a highneed student, so I know what it is like for them.

I was lucky to have had good mentors at BC...[and it] made all the difference for me, which is why I want to be an effective mentor for others.”

By Jack Dunn Director of News & Public Affairs

Paula Dias, a 2007 Boston College alumna and former senior student engagement specialist at Middlesex Community College, has been named manager of the Montserrat Coalition, a mentoring and support program for highfinancial need students.

Dias succeeds Montserrat founder Marina Pastrana ’08, who stepped down in October to take a position with Catholic Extension.

Dias, who received her master’s degree in education in 2009 from BC, was working as a graduate assistant in the University’s Mission and Ministry division and was present at the 2008 meeting when Pastrana first proposed the formation of a coalition to support low-income students. In succeeding Pastrana, Dias says she is honored to carry on the work of helping students to thrive at Boston College.

“I received an e-mail from Marina this fall saying that she was leaving BC and was assisting in

—Paula Dias Lee Pellegrini

the search for candidates to fill the role,” said Dias. “When I read the job description, I knew that it was just what I was looking for.”

Dias says she can relate to the students she will serve in her new role based on her own experience as a BC undergraduate. “I remember the choices I had to make as a high-need student, so I know what it is like for them,” said Dias. “I was lucky to have had good mentors at BC, people such as Perspectives Program Direc-

tor Brian Braman and Lonergan Institute Associate Director Kerry Cronin. It made all the difference for me, which is why I want to be an effective mentor for others.”

Since arriving in mid-November, Dias has met with Montserrat students to gauge their needs and assist them in their efforts to maximize their Boston College experience.

“Students have come in and opened themselves up to me right away, which is a testament to Marina and the office she estab-

lished,” said Dias. “Boston College has done a lot to make this happen, and I look forward to the challenge of taking it to the next level by building relationships across the University that will help to support the varied needs of our 1,400 Montserrat students.”

Burt Howell, who directs the Montserrat Coalition through University Mission and Ministry, said he was delighted to welcome Dias back to Boston College to lead this important initiative.

“Paula brings experience, talent, and leadership to the Montserrat Coalition,” said Howell. “She has a strong record of caring for students and advocating on their behalf. Her commitment to this ministry will help high-financial need students overcome barriers to participation in formational experiences at Boston College.”

Born in Brazil, Dias moved to Boston at the age of five, settling with her family in Brighton. She attended high school in Holliston before enrolling in Boston College in 2003. “I grew up attending BC events because my step-father worked here,” said Dias. “It feels like home when I am on campus.

There is an energy here that I don’t see anywhere else. It is a good feeling to be back.”

Fluent in Portuguese and conversant in Spanish, Dias is currently pursuing her doctorate in higher education administration from Northeastern University, with an emphasis on researching the needs of low-income students and the achievement gap that affects many within this demographic. She said she hopes to apply what she is learning to help students at Boston College, while also being available to address their individual needs.

“Our office in Brock House on College Road is open to all students, and I encourage them to make an appointment to meet with me, or to come by to talk with fellow students in the lounge on the first floor at any time,” said Dias. “It is a very welcoming environment where students can relax and feel at home. I look forward to getting to know them and to helping them take advantage of all that Boston College has to offer.”

Contact Jack Dunn at jack.dunn@bc.edu

Boston College Police Sgt. Jeffrey Postell is the inaugural winner of the Sean Collier Award for Innovations in Community-Oriented Policing.

The award, established by the Massachusetts Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators (MACLEA), is named for the MIT campus police officer slain in a confrontation with the Boston Marathon bombing suspects last April.

“Not many things make me speechless, but in this case I was at a loss for words,” said Postell, who will receive his honor at the Dec. 19 MACLEA meeting. “I have received many awards, honors and other kinds of recognition throughout my career, but this one is different. This is an award named after a young man who had his future cut short, who wanted to do nothing more than to serve honorably and make a difference in his communities through the respect he earned. In essence, everything a police officer should be.

“Words cannot describe how humbled and honored I am to be named the first recipient of this award. But I must say that none of our department’s community policing efforts would be possible if not for the support from our staff, who are actively engaged and participate in those efforts day to day.”

A member of the BCPD for four years, Postell was promoted to

Lee Pellegrini

Postell Honored for Community Policing Sullivan to Take New Role

Sgt. Jeffrey Postell: “I was raised to treat people with respect and to be fair, which is a huge part of being a police officer.”

the rank of sergeant in 2011, with the responsibility of managing the department’s crime prevention and community policing initiatives and serving as the department’s community relations liaison.

Under Postell, according to BC Public Safety Director and Police Chief John King, the Community Resource Officer (CRO) program has grown to its highest level of officer-participation, with 27 members of the department now actively involved as resources officers to residence halls, academic and administrative buildings, and student organizations. Postell has devised an organized approach to

monthly crime prevention presentations for the CROs by developing with them monthly themes and participation material to facilitate and standardize presentations.

King also praised Postell’s use of social media as a communications tool for law enforcement, particularly with students. Postell has improved the BCPD website and developed its Facebook page and Twitter account, and is working with students to develop brief video clips with quick, focused crime-prevention messages for social media outlets. Postell also has been a major supporter of the Massachusetts Special Olympics, King added, and was recently named the statewide campus law enforcement liaison for the organization.

Postell, said King, is “a highly motivated police officer with a strong commitment to community policing, a passion for crime prevention and community relations, and a warm and engaging personality.”

Describing his approach to his job, Postell said, “I was raised to treat people with respect and to be fair, which is a huge part of being a police officer. To me, there are four qualities that are important to this profession: care, compassion, communication and commitment.

I call these my ‘four C’s to effective policing.’”

—Sean Smith

Continued from page 1 he has agreed to continue his service to the University in this new capacity.”

Sullivan, a nationally recognized innovator in human resources management and a popular administrator well-known for his familiarity with and unwavering support of BC employees, had planned to retire from Boston College by the end of this academic year before he was presented with the opportunity to serve as senior advisor to the president.

Executive Vice President Patrick J. Keating said the decision to retain Sullivan in an advisory capacity will enable Boston College to avail itself of his vast knowledge and experience after his successor is in place.

“Leo’s decades-long contributions to Boston College and our employees have been invaluable,” said Keating. “What Leo has done for the University will not be replicated, but this new role is a perfect way for him to assist in and ensure a smooth transition for his eventual replacement.”

A graduate of Northeastern University with a master’s degree from Boston College, Sullivan was a personnel officer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology before joining a two-person human resources staff at Boston College that served 800 employees.

Today, the Department of Hu-

man Resources consists of more than 50 staff members, who serve a workforce of more than 3,400 employees. Sullivan is considered one of the nation’s most respected experts in all of the areas that encompass Human Resources.

“I am very grateful to Boston College,” said Sullivan. “It has been a privilege to be a part of this community, and I am looking forward to my new role with great enthusiasm.”

Eagles Earn Bowl Bid, Will Face Arizona The Boston College football team will play Arizona in the AdvoCare V100 Bowl on Dec. 31, the Eagles’ first postseason appearance since 2010. The game, which takes place at Independence Stadium in Shreveport, La., starts at 12:30 p.m.

BC finished the 2013 regular season with a 7-5 record under first-year head coach Steve Addazio, rebounding from a 2-10 mark in 2012. The game will be televised by ESPN and broadcast on Sports USA Radio Network and the Boston College IMG Sports Radio Network. For other details and updates, see the BC Athletics website at www.bceagles. com.

—Office of News & Public Affairs

T he B oston C ollege

Chronicle december 12, 2013

4

SESQUICENTENNIAL MOMENTS Continued from page 1

Justin Knight

March 21, 2013: Naturalization ceremony at Robsham Theater lege and the Boston College mission gathered together. That is a moment that I will never forget.”

—Graduate student Lauren Riley “Performing in the Boston College Sesquicentennial Concert at Symphony Hall was a dream come true and one of the most cherished memories of my BC career. As a little boy, I grew up playing the viola in a family full of musicians. I saw Doc Severinsen conduct and perform with the Boston Symphony Orchestra when I was 12 years old. I saw Joshua Bell bring a crowd to its feet playing his violin when I was in high school. After these performances, I posted their autographs in my room hoping one day that I would be able to follow in their footsteps to the stage at Symphony Hall.

“I was so blessed for the opportunity to perform in one of the

greatest music halls in the world as the principal violist of the Boston College Symphony Orchestra. This performance was unlike any of the hundreds I had done before. When we arrived for our dress rehearsal the night before, I remember rushing out onto the stage and being so captivated by the space. I played a note and let it resonate for so long into the beautiful ceiling as I looked up to see Beethoven’s name engraved above me in the gold stage frame. It was pure happiness.”

and very public dispute with Harvard in the 1890s over the quality of our curriculum. Harvard announced that it would no longer admit graduates of BC (and the other Jesuit schools) to its law school, on the grounds that a Boston College degree was of inferior quality — in a sense, not a “real” undergraduate degree...Jesuits staunchly defended their system against this perceived insult, but at the same time they also recognized that Harvard may well have been right; our curriculum subsequently changed to adhere to the more substantial and familiar four-year undergraduate program.

“Though the two institutions had had happier relations since then, President Faust’s appearance marked an important closing of one historical chapter as well as the opening of another one.”

—Clough Professor of History James O’Toole

www.bc.edu/150

THE

Sesquicentennial Lee Pellegrini

April 30, 2013: Founders Day Celebration, Corcoran Commons Gary Gilbert

—Kenny Ierardi, Class of 2013 “It was quite a year, but of the many events the one that stands out for me was the academic convocation featuring Drew Gilpin Faust, the president of Harvard University. The historical significance of this was sharply drawn. As many people know, Boston College had a famous

Celebrating

March 23, 2013: Sesquicentennial Concert at Symphony Hall, with Chris O’Donnell ’92

“Going into the liturgy, my main concern was not the Sesquicentennial Mass itself, as Campus Ministry has ample experience with large liturgies in non-liturgical settings. My worry was that while the Mass would be a fun and exciting experience for people, the fun and excitement might overtake the reason for us being there and it would become a great event for which the Mass was simply a backdrop.

“I was extremely happy that the opposite happened. This Mass was a spiritual experience for all in attendance. All there came to worship God through the liturgy and with each other. There’s a reason we use the term ‘celebrating’ the liturgy and the Sesquicentennial Mass at Fenway Park was a shining example of what this celebration can look like.”

—Campus Minister Ellen Modica

That Feeling of Ownership: It’s Just a Touch Away Study considers impact of touchscreen technology on shopping choices

By Sean Hennessey Staff Writer

If you hope to stick to a budget this holiday season, you might want to stay away from buying gifts online with a touchscreen tablet: A new study by Carroll School of Management researchers finds that shopping for products on a tablet can make you feel like you already own them — and if you feel like you already own something, you’re more likely to buy it.

In “Tablets, Touchscreens, and Touchpads: How Varying Touch Interfaces Trigger Psychological Ownership and Endowment,” which is being published in the Journal of Consumer Psychology, Egan Professor of Information Systems James Gips and Associate Professor of Marketing Stevan Adam Brasel examine the so-called endowment effect — the idea of overvaluing things we own compared to things we don’t own — and how it is affected by such interactive technology as touchscreen tablets.

Since research has shown that

James Gips, left, and Stevan Adam Brasel, authors of the study “Tablets, Touchscreens, and Touchpads: How Varying Touch Interfaces Trigger Psychological Ownership and Endowment.” (Photo by Lee Pellegrini)

simply touching — or even imagining touching — an object produces a feeling of ownership, say Gips and Brasel, what happens in an age when the object’s image is on the touchscreen of an iPad, smart phone or similar device?

The Carroll School researchers had separate groups of people surf online for a sweater and a city walking-tour service using a touchscreen, touchpad, and normal computer mouse in one study, and sweatshirts and tents on iPads and laptops in a second study. After choosing a product, participants were asked how much money it

would take for them to sell their product if someone else wanted to buy it. Those using the touchscreen wanted almost 50 percent more money for their chosen product than those using the mouse or touchpad laptop.

Explaining the reason for such elevated perceptions of ownership, Brasel says, “This is the first evidence that we know of exploring this endowment effect via touchscreen interface. When we reach out to grab a product in the real world, we’ll hold the product in one hand and touch the product with the other hand. So the act of

doing that on a tablet mimics our real-world experience much better than when we’re operating a mouse that in turn moves a pointer that is on some unconnected screen we’re not even holding.“ Brasel and Gips found that sense of ownership is magnified when the purchasable item has a touch component to it.

“There’s a much more natural fit with a product that actually has touch as a real dimension, like a sweatshirt,” says Brasel. “Touch isn’t really a relevant dimension of a city tour. So we see this effect become much, much stronger for products that have very strong touch-based importance to them.”

Given that consumers are projected to spend as much as $82 billion on online shopping this holiday season, Brasel says the study results — while not examining likely purchases with a touchscreen tablet — could be promising for retailers.

“It suggests they should be putting a lot of effort into optimizing their touchscreen versions of their websites, the ones designed for phones and tablets. And that you want as much direct touch as possible, and the pictures of your products to be as vivid and as real as possible because that will

generate these ownership perceptions. Retailers should work with that and not necessarily against it.

It does seem like E-commerce is moving toward tablets and other touch-based devices, so this effect is only going to get more important in time, rather than less.”

The study may open some eyes in the marketing industry on how consumers are targeted, add the authors.

“One of the key things we try to argue across all of our work is that marketers need to pay more attention to the interfaces people use to access content,” says Brasel.

“We’ve spent a whole lot of time as marketers exploring the content itself, like ‘How do we make this website more useful?’ ‘What happens if we use this site versus that site?’ Or ‘What about this ad versus that ad?’

“But what this work is starting to show is the interfaces that people use to access that content can have as strong of an effect on consumer behavior as the content itself. As marketers we need to do more research into interfaces because they can drastically change how we process identical content.”

Contact Sean Hennessey at sean.hennessey@bc.edu

T he B oston C ollege

Chronicle december 12, 2013

5

Bringing Spirituality Into the Home — and Keeping It There

By Kathleen Sullivan Staff Writer

Tim Muldoon, assistant to the vice president for University Mission and Ministry, has been a student of the Ignatian tradition since his high school days at Loyola Academy in Chicago. He continued his Ignatian exploration as an undergraduate at Boston College — a period that included a formative study-abroad experience at Oxford University — and in writing his well-received book The Ignatian Workout.

So, when Muldoon became a parent it seemed only natural that he would look to the principles of St. Ignatius as a guide to raising his children. Muldoon and his wife Sue, a director of religious education in a suburban parish west of Boston, went on to develop rules they feel cultivate faith in everyday family life. They offer these guidelines to parents in a newly published book, Six Sacred Rules for Families: A Spirituality for the Home.

“Parenting is already an act of faith. You don’t know what kind of person your kid will grow up to be. Everything you do is guesswork on some level. Every decision as a parent is predicated on faith,” said Tim Muldoon.

Sprinkled with stories from the Bible and references to American films, Six Sacred Rules is an accessible guide that, according to Muldoon, can help parents find

Tim Muldoon, assistant to the vice president for University Mission and Ministry, and his wife, Sue. (Photo courtesy of Tim Muldoon)

authentic spirituality “embedded right in the messy midst of [everyday life].” The aim of the book, he says, is to help parents equip their children with a religious vocabulary and faith practices that give them the tools with which to make more reflective judgments when they are older.

“A lot of parents are overwhelmed and are content to outsource their children’s religious development,” said Muldoon.

“We teach our children manners, language, even things about sports we like, but we don’t want to teach them religion? Ours is a culture of pluralism and so we have to be more deliberate about what it is we want to pass on.”

The Muldoons’ Rules for Family Spirituality are: •God Brings Our Family Together on Pilgrimage •Our Love of One Another Leads to Joy •Our Family Doesn’t Care about “Success”

•God Stretches Our Family toward His Kingdom •God Will Help Us •We Must Learn Which Desires Lead Us to Freedom The Muldoons’ accumulated wisdom as both parents and educators converge in Six Sacred Rules.

“This is not just theory. This has been road-tested,” chuckled Muldoon, whose children are 13, 11, and nine.

The book, Muldoon points out, is not a user’s guide to religious indoctrination, but rather about showing parents how to invite their children into rich, spiritual traditions as a way of helping them develop the habits of being more reflective, thoughtful and loving. The hope is, he said, that these practices will provide a launching point for children so that as they get older they make the connection between these practices and God and Jesus.

“Authentic spirituality begins with practices that bring us to

Economics Forum Includes Nobel Laureate McFadden

By Ed Hayward Staff Writer

Nobel laureate Daniel McFadden, the E. Morris Cox Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of California Berkeley, will be a featured speaker today at an international conference on consumer demand hosted by the Economics Department.

McFadden, who won the 2000 Nobel Prize in Economics for his research into behavioral patterns in individual decisionmaking, will discuss the costs associated with poor choices made in high-risk areas.

The three-day conference, which will take place in the Murray Room of the Yawkey Center, focuses on traditional and new models economists use to explore and understand consumer demand, according to Associate Professor of Economics Stefan Hoderlein, a lead organizer of the

conference along with colleagues from University College London.

“There will be a lot of different perspectives at this conference,” Hoderlein said. “We’ve focused on bringing together experts in the areas of applied economics, economic theory and econometric data analysis. The idea is to get a conversation going.”

In addition to McFadden, the conference lineup of more than 20 economists includes Harvard University’s Ariel Pakes, Northwestern University’s Charles Manski and MIT’s Jerry Hausman.

Hoderlein said the area of consumer demand is a dynamic topic in the field of economics.

Not only are scholars viewing demand through the lenses of other disciplines, but they now have access to massive and highly detailed data sets generated by the companies that operate ecommerce and search engine sites

on the Internet.

“This has always been a dynamic area, but the situation we have now is data gathered by companies like Amazon.com or Google,” said Hoderlein. “We have large consumer data sets that span hundreds of thousands of individuals and one of the things we’ll be looking at is how that will affect this field.”

Hoderlein will speak as part of a panel tomorrow, joined by BC’s Barbara A. and Patrick E. Roche Professor of Economics Arthur Lewbel. Associate Professor of Economics Julie Holland Mortimer is also participating in the conference.

Co-sponsors of the event include the Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice and the Institute for Fiscal Studies, both affiliated with Britain’s Economic & Social Research Council.

Contact Ed Hayward at ed.hayward@bc.edu

things that are good. The key word is practice,” said Muldoon.

Six Sacred Rules highlights practices families can incorporate into their home life, such as grace before meals, Nativity scenes and Advent calendars, blessings before big events, and service projects, among others.

The Muldoons also adapted the Examen, the cornerstone of Ignatian spirituality, for their children.

Before bedtime, they talk about what made them happy during the day, what made them sad and what they are looking forward to tomorrow. They thank God for what made them happy, ask for God’s help for when they are sad and pray for God’s presence in the coming day.

“It’s not magic,” said Muldoon. “There’s something very intuitive about saying, ‘Let’s go over our day. Let’s ask where God has been.’ It’s rooted in a really basic theology that says God is there.

We just need to pay attention. I want [my children] to develop the habit of being reflective.”

Yet the book is not a guar-

BC to Host Poe Event Next Month Edgar Allan Poe’s 205th birthday this coming Jan. 19 will be marked at a Boston College event, “The Poe Statue Project: Public Art, Creativity, Politics, and the Law,” that will celebrate the city of his birth and provide an overview of the successful public art initiative to commemorate his ties to Boston.

The legendary author’s birthday observance, which will take place at 3 p.m. in Devlin 101, will feature Professor of English Paul Lewis — who chairs The Edgar Allan Poe Foundation of Boston [www. bostonpoe.org] — award-winning sculptor Stefanie Rocknak, Boston Art Commission Director Karin Goodfellow, and Boston arts lawyer Andrew D. Epstein discussing the challenges of the public art process and the place of Poe in the city’s rich literary heritage.

With the support of Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, the Poe Foundation has in recent years worked with the Boston Art Commission on the creation of a sculpture that will permanently commemorate Poe’s connection to the city. Born here in 1809, Poe returned to Boston in 1827 and published some of his most important works here, including Tamerlane and Other Poems, “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “Hop-Frog.”

Rocknak was chosen to design the life-size bronze sculpture, “Poe Returning to Boston,” which she

anteed recipe for how to create a child who will grow up to be a practicing Catholic, Muldoon said.

“Ultimately, the Holy Spirit will do that work. It has to be an act of grace that draws a person to God. I can do my work as a parent of witnessing to my faith as much as I can. I can create all the conditions that can make that likely, but I can’t make that happen.”

If Muldoon has one hope for children it is that they derive their sense of self-worth from God, as articulated in the Muldoons’ third rule: Our Family Doesn’t Care about “Success.” Muldoon wants children to have a “profound sense that they’re beloved and that their self-worth comes from that long before it comes from what they look like, how good at sports they are, what their SAT scores are— the external measures.

“I want them to be who God made them to be, not what the world tells them to be.”

Contact Kathleen Sullivan at kathleen.sullivan@bc.edu

Courtesy of Stefanie Rocknak

BC administrator and wife author book on spirituality for the family

Model of the Edgar Allan Poe statue commissioned by a foundation chaired by Prof. Paul Lewis (English).

describes as depicting Poe “just off the train, walking south towards his place of birth. With a trunk full of ideas — and worldwide success — he is finally coming home.”

Now in the final phase of fundraising, organizers hope to install the Rocknak sculpture in Poe Square, a plaza opposite the entrance to Boston Common at the corner of Boylston and Charles streets, this coming year.

“Poe deserves this tribute,” according to Lewis, “not despite, but because, he quarreled with Bostonbased writers of his time, whom he called ‘Frogpondians’ and ‘so-called transcendentalists.’ By resisting then-fashionable didacticism and promoting literature for its own sake, Poe became a foundational figure in the development of popular culture.”

For details on the Jan. 19 event or the Poe project, contact Paul Lewis at paul.lewis@bc.edu or ext.2-3710.

—Rosanne Pellegrini

T he B oston C ollege

Chronicle december 12, 2013

6

By Ed Hayward Staff Writer

They don’t make them like Frank McLaughlin anymore.

The associate professor of economics, who will retire at the end of this semester after 52 years on the faculty, is a legendary classroom teacher, able to weave stories from his own life and times into his lectures on labor economics and the history of economic thought.

A lifelong Bostonian, McLaughlin bridges a Boston College era rooted in its place as a college for working-class men from the city to its prominence today as one of the nation’s leading research universities.

A child of the Great Depression, he knew the frosty edge of washing up in a coldwater flat. As a kid, he sold the seven daily newspapers once printed in the city, hawking them from a South End curb, peeling one after another from his stack one day in 1942 after the Cocoanut Grove nightclub fire killed 492 people.

At age 14, with Americans off fighting in World War II, he passed for 16 and took a job loading mailbags for the US Postal Service from 3:30-11:30 p.m.

“I was a war service temporary, indefinite employee,” said

Sean Smith

Retiring McLaughlin a Bridge Between Boston College Eras

Assoc. Prof. Frank McLaughlin (Economics) greets friends at his retirement reception last week. He will step down from the faculty after 52 years at semester’s end.

McLaughlin, who grew up in a family of eight that lived in Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood.

The Post Office shifts that helped his family make ends meet took a toll academically and McLaughlin was “asked to leave” the city’s prestigious Boston Latin School. But he settled in at Roxbury Memorial High School, where he played football and earned his diploma after five years.

McLaughlin was working as a draftsman in a Boston engineering firm when a friend encouraged him to take the entrance exam for BC’s former Intown School – the precursor to the Woods College of Advancing Studies. He enrolled two weeks later, taking night classes on

Newbury Street.

What with working full time and being called to active duty during the Korean War, McLaughlin completed his bachelor’s degree in seven years. But along the way, courses in collective bargaining and social ethics taught by Fr. Thomas Shortell, SJ, convinced him to pursue a graduate degree in economics.

“I got the idea that I could build a better social order, but from Fr. Shortell I understood that I needed a technical competence in a subject like economics,” said McLaughlin. “[Fr. Shortell] was an awfully prounion guy, but I learned a lot in those classes.”

McLaughlin did his master’s degree at BC at night as well, now

obituary

A memorial Mass will be celebrated on Monday, Dec. 16, at 11 a.m. in St. Ignatius Church for David John Smith MA ’67, PhD ’71, a mainstay of Boston College’s Counseling Services for four decades, who died on Nov. 28. He was 73.

Dr. Smith’s arrival at BC — he came in 1965 to pursue his master’s degree in psychology, and during 1967-68 was a teaching fellow at the School of Education — coincided with a period that saw growing demand for a broader array of counseling to serve college students’ psychological and emotional needs, as well as their academic and vocational development.

In 1968, Dr. Smith joined the newly created Office of Counseling Services as assistant director; he would go on to serve as the office’s associate director and, most recently, as senior staff psychologist.

His work involved individual and group therapy, crisis intervention and evaluation, in addition to academic and career planning-related counseling. Dr. Smith created, chaired and served on numerous committees that dealt with a range of issues, from student orientation to learning disabilities to staff hiring.

Colleagues and friends also described Dr. Smith as a deeply spiritual person who participated

Photo courtesy of Ellen Modica

David Smith; Helped Develop Counseling Services

in many prayer groups, scriptural reading groups and discussions, co-coordinated the Saturday afternoon liturgy at St. Ignatius, and acted on his beliefs through generosity of spirit, volunteerism and support of humanitarian organizations. Through his professional and faith activities, they said, Dr. Smith helped shape the lives of numerous BC students as well as faculty, administrators and staff.

“David began his career at BC at a time when the focus of university counseling was more about academic adjustment and removing obstacles to learning and achievement,” said Associate Vice President for Student Affairs and University Counseling Services Director Thomas McGuinness.

“Over the years, university counseling has become more clinical. David’s career paralleled that

of the profession as a whole. While he was an accomplished clinician he maintained his firm belief that counseling was about learning and the development of the whole person. He remained both a dedicated educator and a therapist who was extraordinarily committed to the students with whom he worked.

He loved his students, the department and Boston College. He was a true ‘University Citizen.’”

Dr. Smith was a strong advocate for students with disabilities, serving as inaugural chair of the Committee on Learning Disabilities and supporting the creation of the Academic Development Center, now known as the Connors Learning Center, noted Lynch School of Education Professor Emeritus Jean Mooney.

Dr. Smith is survived by his sister-in-law Carol Smith, and his nieces and nephews Diane Holiday, Matthew Smith, Michael Smith and Julie Ellis.

Donations may be made in Dr. Smith’s memory to Heifer Project International, Box 8058, Little Rock, AR 2203-8058 [www.heifer. org]. Expressions of sympathy may be sent to Diane Holiday, 605 Franklin Court, Forked River, NJ 08731.

—Sean Smith The full text of this obituary may be viewed at http://bit.ly/J2tc50

supporting a growing family. On the recommendation of Fr. Robert McEwan, SJ, then chair of the Economics Department, he ventured across the Charles River to take up doctoral studies at MIT. His dissertation on Boston’s port workers connected figures as disparate as MIT’s future Nobel laureate Robert Solow, a member of his review panel, and John “Red” Moran, the president of the International Longshoremen’s Association, who taught McLaughlin the realities of labor economics on the waterfront.

Fr. McEwan brought him back to BC in 1961 as part of the college’s nascent plans to grow into a doctoral-granting research university.

“Frank was a perfect candidate with his PhD from MIT, which was one of the best at that time, and his Boston roots,” said Associate Professor of Economics Harold Petersen, who joined BC in 1960.

“And Frank wanted to be here.”

The milestones in his distinguished career include a Ford Foundation-funded study of urban renewal, a large-scale evaluation of federal manpower programs and tireless support of labor economics colleagues at area universities. But it is as a teacher that McLaughlin made his mark, educating an estimated 13,000 students.

“It’s my firm belief that storytelling is part of effective teaching,” said Petersen. “Students remember the stories they’ve heard and that helps teachers make their points. There is no better storyteller than Frank.”

Petersen said his longtime colleague has offered a much-valued perspective on both tradition and change, from a time when a “Boston College man” was most likely a man of the city itself.

“He does fit the profile of ‘Mr. Boston College,’” said Petersen. “At the same time, he bridges from where we came to where we are. He is a bridge to the modern world we live in and the national university we’ve become.”

McLaughlin and his wife Clare, married 64 years, raised 11 children, nine of whom graduated from BC. They went on to become police officers, entrepreneurs, social service workers, college administrators and federal officials. Currently, five of his grandchildren attend the University.

McLaughlin said it’s hard to sum up his 66 years at BC as both a student and professor.

“I’ve been lucky,” he said.

“Lucky to be at BC and to be in this department. The amazing thing is that they’ve paid me to talk.”

Contact Ed Hayward at ed.hayward@bc.edu

‘Bump Water’ Earns the Top Spot in MBA Competition Vitamin-enriched water may soon become a household item for expectant mothers, thanks to a business plan written up by a team of Carroll School of Management MBA students whose insight, analysis, and strategic recommendations were enough to wow judges at the Carroll School’s annual business plan competition — and may help send the product to market as early as next year.

The competition, held last Friday in Fulton Hall, capped a semesterlong effort by 18 MBA teams who either worked on business plans for ideas they thought of themselves, or created business plans based on ideas hatched by other entrepreneurs. The winning team, #BirdsandtheMBeeAs, based their plan on an idea submitted by two women from Brooklyn for a product called Bump Water, a supplemental water women of child-bearing age can drink for necessary nutrients instead of taking pills.

“Most women now need to take a supplement for folic acid and some of the other vitamins,” says team member Mary Lentowski. “The water really allows them to do this in a way that helps settle their stomach, get the hydration they need, and be compliant with their doctor’s regimen.

So we think that Bump Water really fills a niche for that.”

Adds Brendan Syron, “Because it’s a supplement, we’re not going to need FDA approval. So we’re going to be able to hit the market just like any other products that you’d find in GNC or any of these supplemental vitamin pills.”

Entrepreneurs such as the creators of Bump Water license the students to write the business plans free of charge, although they maintain all intellectual property rights. In recent years, 60-70 percent of work done by Boston College MBA students has been adopted by entrepreneurs who end up taking their concepts to market.

“Our MBA students did a wonderful job all semester,” says Adjunct Lecturer Greg Stoller, director of the MBA business planning course.

“They really took this from start to finish and they deserve a lot of credit for a job well done.“ —Sean Hennessey

T he B oston C ollege

Chronicle december 12, 2013

7

WELCOME ADDITIONS Connell School of Nursing Assistant Professor Carina Katigbak’s research interests are in cardiovascular health disparities and chronic illness management, with a focus on hypertension management among AsianAmerican immigrants using community health worker interventions. Katigbak earned a bachelor’s degree from Ryerson University and a master’s degree and doctorate from New York University, where she was a research scientist; she also was a fellow with the CDC-Prevention Research Center at NYU’s Langone Medical Center. She has held teaching positions at NYU’s College of Nursing and Dominican College in New York, and worked as a nurse at Yale New Haven Hospital. Katigbak has been published in the Journal of Professional Nursing and Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, among others, and teaches Nursing Health Assessment Across the Lifespan.

Adjunct Associate Professor of Economics Tracy L. Regan studies labor economics, health and pharmaceutical economics and industrial organization. Prior to joining the Boston College faculty, Regan was an assistant professor of economics at the University of Miami for nine years. Regan earned her PhD from the University of Arizona, where she returned as a visiting scholar for the past two years.

Her research has been published in journals that include the Journal of Human Resources, Economic Inquiry and the Journal of Population Economics.

Assistant Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences Jeremy D. Shakun is a geologist who studies the earth, its oceans and the atmosphere for patterns and causes of climate change across millions of years. Shakun’s research has been published in journals including Science, Nature and Geophysical Research Letters. He is developing new data from geochemical evidence contained in sources including marine sediments, glacial deposits and speleothems, the mineral formations found in caves. Shakun earned his doctorate at Oregon State University and was a post-doctoral fellow at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Boston University and Columbia University.

Laura White is a full-time clinical assistant professor at the Connell School of Nursing, after working part-time as a clinical faculty member in the school’s Pediatric Nurse Practitioner program. White’s clinical and research interests include integrative health care, adolescent mental health in primary care, stress reduction in children and adolescents and school health.

She earned a bachelor’s degree and doctorate from Boston College and a master’s degree from Columbia University. A certified pediatric nurse practitioner, White works at Walden Behavioral Care in Waltham and as a school nurse.

—Ed Hayward and Kathleen Sullivan Photos by Lee Pellegrini and Caitlin Cunningham “Welcome Additions,” an occasional feature, profiles new faculty members at Boston College.

Toys for Tots Ends Tomorrow Boston College Athletics is accepting donations for the Toys for Tots campaign through tomorrow, Dec. 13.

Bring new, unwrapped toys to the External Operations Office, Room 238 in Conte Forum, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Those who donate toys will receive a free pair of tickets to an upcoming men’s basketball, women’s basketball or men’s hockey game; quantities are limited and tickets will be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis.

Newsmakers Interviewed on Public Radio International-WNYC’s “The Takeaway,” Prof. James Bretzke, SJ (STM), offered an historical context for recent remarks by Pope Francis urging world leaders to “attack the structural causes of inequality” and to fight to give healthcare, education, and employment opportunities to all citizens.

Assoc. Prof. of the Practice Tiziana Dearing (GSSW) provided a set of criteria to help donors decide who and what to support with a year-end gift in a piece for WBUR’s “Cognoscenti.”

Lynch School of Education faculty members Brennan Professor Andy Hargreaves and Boisi Professor Henry Braun appeared on a podcast for American Public Media to discuss their study showing that the emphasis on accountability since No Child Left Behind may in some ways be harming students, not helping them.

Writing in Today’s Catholic Teacher, Roche Center for Catholic Education Associate Director Kristin Barstow Melley contended that Catholic K-12 educators can foster faith-building in any class, regardless of the subject.

Carroll School of Management senior Kathryn Kavner, a student of Assoc. Prof. Gerald Kane (CSOM), explored how social media is helping to revitalize a heritage product — Ball mason jars — in a guest post for Forbes.com.

One aspect of the massive open online course movement that has not been fully analyzed is who controls the knowledge, wrote Research Prof. Philip Altbach (LSOE), director of the Center for

BC in the Media During this past week, the world mourned and remembered Nelson Mandela, the first black president of South Africa and for many a symbol of the struggle for freedom. For Associate Professor of Sociology Zine Magubane, who was born in South Africa and lived there during Mandela’s presidency, the memories of this legendary figure are particularly vivid, and she shared her impressions with several Boston-area media outlets.

“The reason that people listened to Lee Pellegrini him,” she told the Boston Herald, “is because he listened to people.” Magubane pointed to Mandela’s involvement in the Freedom Charter campaign, which invited South Africans to offer post-apartheid visions of their country, as an example of his determination to move his country forward.

“His way of leadership was always leadership by consensus, from the beginning.”

Interviewed by New England Cable News, Magubane said Mandela “absorbed his energy very much from all of the people of South Africa and the movement that he was involved in. So even though he preached forgiveness, if forgiveness wasn’t part of the movement from the beginning, people would not have listened.”

International Higher Education, in a post for the Chronicle of Higher Education “Worldwise.” He also gave his assessment of Massachusetts students’ performance in the latest PISA assessment on WBURFM.

BC BRIEFING Publications The Journal of Business Ethics accepted for publication the paper “Contextual and Individual Dimensions of Taxpayer DecisionMaking,” by Carroll School of Management Prof. Jeffrey Cohen and Assoc. Prof. Gil Manzon.

Honors/Appointments The Children’s Bureau selected Donahue and DiFelice Professor

NOTA BENE

of Social Work Ruth G. McRoy as a recipient of an Adoption Excellence Award, which honor states, local agencies, private organizations, courts, businesses, individuals, and families for their work in increasing adoptions from foster care.

Time and a Half Prof. Maxim D. Shrayer (Slavic and Eastern Languages) presented “Jewish-Russian Poets as Witnesses to the Shoah” at the Boston College symposium “Artistic Representations of the Holocaust.”

JOBS The following are among the most recent positions posted by the Department of Human Resources.

For more information on employment opportunities at Boston College, see www.bc.edu/offices/hr: Provost and Dean of Faculties Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Biology Department

Graduate School of Social Work Adjunct Associate Professor Marylou Sudders is the 2014 recipient of the Endowment Award for Leadership in the Advancement of Mental Health. Each year, the Endowment for the Advancement of Psychotherapy at Massachusetts General Hospital honors an individual who has made a major contribution to the advancement of mental health in the community. Sudders was recognized for her many contributions to the care of individuals with mental health needs as the Massachusetts commissioner of mental health and in other positions of leadership in the mental health field.

Technology Manager, Residential Life

Boston College-Ireland has won a 2013 Eircom Spider Award, Ireland’s most prestigious recognition of excellence and achievement online, for its historical project Century Ireland, which was the inaugural winner in the new category of Irish arts, heritage and culture.

—Office of News & Public Affairs

Fiscal Assistant, Auxiliary Services

Senior Research Associate, Center for Retirement Research Accounting Specialist, Student Services Grant Administrator, College of Arts and Sciences Service Center Associate Information Technology Consultant Executive Director, Career Center

Assistant Dean, Carroll Graduate School of Management First Cook, Dining Services

T he B oston C ollege

Chronicle december 12, 2013

8

Williams Set to Turn Page Continued from page 1 ment major writes poetry in his spare time, and is writing a book, tentatively titled A King, A Queen and A Conscience, that will chronicle his own experiences as a scholarship student-athlete.

Williams has also accelerated his own academic calendar, and is scheduled to graduate today, just three-and-a-half semesters after arriving in Chestnut Hill. He may become the only player in college football to pick up his diploma in the same week that he travels to New York City’s Downtown Athletic Club as a finalist for the Heisman Trophy, to be awarded Saturday night to the top collegiate player in the land.

“I think he represents what Boston College stands for,” says BC head football coach Steve Addazio.

“He’s a well-rounded guy. He’s a guy who values and cherishes his education, his opportunity to play major college football, and being part of a team.

“He’s not just all focused on football,” Addazio adds. “He’s got a lot of lot of different interests – just like a typical college student would have. I’ve been around a lot of different players in my career, and I think that when you have a guy that represents all of those things that we hold dear in college football, he should be held in esteem.”

Williams, the son of Jamaican parents, didn’t think he had much chance of winning a football scholarship when his high school career was disrupted by his family’s move from Kennesaw, Ga., to Schnecksville, Pa., after his sophomore year.

“I had moved around so much that I was a little under the radar,” he admits. “Plus, I really didn’t like

BC SCENES

the recruiting process. It was so stressful – coaches would come to the school and take you out of class for an hour or hour-and-a-half, and then they would be calling our home every night.”

He had received offers from half a dozen schools – including Vanderbilt, Rutgers, Temple and Connecticut – when he made his official recruiting visit to Boston College during his junior year. “I liked it right away; it was a big school, but not so big that you could get lost in the crowd. I liked the location, right on the edge of the city. And I liked the players and the work ethic that I saw here.”

Once enrolled, Williams found an aspect of the University that was even more attractive to him: “They hold you to a higher level of excellence,” he says. “You are here for a reason. They really believe that you can be a real student-athlete. Being held to that standard has shaped me into a better person. You learn that you are capable of pushing yourself past limits and setting new, higher goals for yourself.

“I am glad that I was blessed with the opportunity to come here.”

Many others on campus share the same gratitude. “From the first day I had Andre in class, he impressed me as a deep thinker,” says Campus Minister Daniel Leahy, who teaches The Courage to Know class as part of First Year Experience. “He was always one who could identify a good question and take himself there.”

Three years later, Leahy chose Williams and classmate Catherine Guerrier to be the TAs for his course — which explores the

“If I had it to do all over again, I would definitely come back to BC,” says Williams. “We are all so finite and small and we see life one day at a time.

But at the end of it, when we get to see it from beginning to end, it’s amazing. Everything has worked out for the best.” (Photo by Lee Pellegrini)

“landscape of the college scene” and the transition to college life, he explains — this fall.

“I looked at them and thought they would be good role models, they would help the students ‘get into’ the course, encourage them to think deeply and learn to ask good questions. We talk about what it means to be a learner, and to be a learner at BC. What is a Jesuit, Catholic education all about? We share our stories and talk about faith, justice, relationships – all topics on campus.”

Having a football star as a teaching assistant causes some freshmen to be star-struck, says Leahy. “They bring in posters and things for him to sign all of the time,” he laughs.

“But once we start class and get down to business, they are impressed with Andre when he talks to them about the importance of being a good person.”

With his natural power, speed and football ability, Williams is a sure bet to wind up as a player in the National Football League in the future. But he feels he has even higher goals for his life’s work.

“I want to start a non-profit

GREETING THE SEASON

This past week saw the start of the holiday season at Boston College, as University President William P. Leahy, SJ, spoke at the annual Christmas tree-lighting ceremony on Dec. 4, above, and the University Chorale and Symphony Orchestra performed their annual Christmas concert on Dec. 6. For more holiday scenes, see the Boston College Instagram [instagram.com/bostoncollege#] and the BC YouTube channel [www.youtube.com/BostonCollege].

Photos by Caitlin Cunningham

organization for children,” he says, “perhaps doing it from a sportstraining base. Then I can work from there, mentoring children.

“There are so many other ways you can teach kids beyond teachers and books. They are learning from music, they are learning from tele-

vision, they are learning from their friends – there are so many factors out there. Kids can benefit from learning from people who have been in the places they are trying to get to. They say they want to go to college, but how do they get there?

Especially, say, inner-city kids who may not have the same life choices as more privileged kids.

“I think that you can go a long way by increasing a child’s social capital, and teaching them different things that you just might not learn by sitting in school all day.”

As he prepares to play his final game in maroon and gold during the bowl season, Williams says that he is still thrilled with his decision to come to Boston College. “If I had it to do all over again, I would definitely come back to BC,” he says. “We are all so finite and small and we see life one day at a time.

But at the end of it, when we get to see it from beginning to end, it’s amazing,” he says. “Everything has worked out for the best.”

The women’s soccer team exults after advancing to the NCAA Tournament “Elite Eight” round. (Photo courtesy BC Athletics)

Optimism for Women’s Soccer The Boston College women’s soccer team continues to be a national contender, advancing to its 11th consecutive NCAA Tournament this season and falling just one game short of the College Cup, soccer’s version of the Final Four.

After three wins in the NCAA Tournament and outscoring their opponents by a margin of 10-2, the Eagles fell to Florida State in the Elite Eight round, 4-0. The team finished with a 13-10-1 record, and left head coach Alison Foley with a lot of positives to look back on in 2013.

“I think the team had great chemistry all year,” said Foley, who has won more games in program history than any other women’s soccer coach at the Heights. “When you report Aug. 5 and you’re still playing in December you need to have a committed team, great leadership, and certainly talent. We had a great balance of all three.”

The Eagles will graduate seven seniors, who during their time at BC played in four NCAA tournaments, three Sweet 16s, two Elite Eights and the 2010 College Cup — and compiled a 52-30-8 record. The character of a team is often defined by its senior class, said Foley.

“They have represented BC the longest, take a lot of pride in wearing the jersey, and played knowing it’s their senior year,” said Foley. “Our

senior group was one of the most determined classes we have ever had and certainly put the team on its back towards the end of the season.”

That character and determination was on full display in the NCAA tournament in the person of senior captain Patrice Vettori. Right before the NCAA Tournament, she blew out her knee and found herself sidelined for the remainder of her final season. But rather than wallow in sadness, Foley noted, Vettori remained a huge part of the 2013 Eagles.

“Patrice just continued to be an incredible leader and motivator for the group. She was one of our best examples of selflessness, and of the team-first mentality that is the foundation of being a BC women’s soccer player.”

Making the Elite Eight was not only important for the 2013 team, Foley said, but for the future of the women’s soccer program.

“When you are successful and have good runs into the Final Four and Final Eight, the best recruits in the country want to play at the best schools,” explained Foley. “Keeping our standards high as a coaching staff and continually not settling for mediocrity as a program has always been a creed to our coaching. It’s a motivated staff and that is contagious to the players and recruits.”

—Michael Maloney