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MARIA HAYES
As graduation day slips further away in
her rearview mirror, Maria Hayes' affection
for what her alma mater meant to her
only intensifies.
"The longer that I've been out of St.
Bonaventure, the more grateful I am that I
chose to go there," said Hayes, the com-
munications coordinator for the Francis-
can friars of Holy Name Province.
"Looking back, I've realized how many
opportunities I've received because of its
close network, because of the way the fac-
ulty and staff treat its students and the rela-
tionship that the two have with each
other."
Hayes landed her first job -- as a re-
porter at the Warsaw (N.Y.) Country
Courier -- months before graduation. It
didn't hurt that the editor was a former
colleague at The Bona Venture student
newspaper who recognized the quality of
Hayes' work.
"Everything from the small class sizes to
the opportunities you have to get involved
with extracurricular activities -- like the
newspaper immediately your freshman year
-- those are all things that helped me get
to where I am today and I don't think that if
I went to a larger school I would have had
the same opportunities," Hayes said.
WINTER 2013-2014
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IAN ROGERS
The hard work of applying to a
graduate program has paid off for
Ian Rogers, who is reveling in the op-
portunity to deepen his study of
Spanish language and literature as a
Gilman Fellow at the Johns Hopkins
University in Baltimore, Md.
"What really excites me," said
Rogers, "is the opportunity to work
with scholars here and scholars in
other universities and really share in
the discovery, research and the learn-
ing."
As a Gilman Fellow in the Spanish
section of the Department of German
and Romance Languages and Litera-
tures, Rogers has five years to work
on his doctoral thesis while teaching
Spanish grammar at Hopkins and
working with faculty on research
and seminars for his dissertation.
"My ultimate goal after gradua-
tion from Hopkins would be to find
a professorship teaching Spanish lit-
erature at a university," Rogers said.
Rogers' passion for research was
inspired in large part by his work as
an undergraduate at St. Bonaven-
ture. His relationships with his pro-
fessors and the classes he was able
to take not only prepared him for
12
the work he would take on as a graduate student,
but also helped him to discover his unique niche in
the wide world of Spanish language and literature.
A class with Dr. Leigh Simone, la Generación del '98,
and one taught by Dr. Dan Tate on the philosophy of
Nietzsche combined to influence him on the focus of
his future studies.
"What really drives
me in my research here
at Hopkins is the oppor-
tunity to discover new
things and to add new
things to my field," ex-
plained Rogers, whose
typical day includes
both teaching and
going to seminars.
"There's a unique role
that grad students play
here at Hopkins. We're
not quite faculty and
we're not quite stu-
dents -- we play a little
bit of both. We're
teaching the undergraduates and we're taking semi-
nars with professors, so we really do get the best of
both worlds.
BACKFILE
Class Year:
2013
Major:
Modern Languages
Hometown:
Buffalo, N.Y.
What I Miss the Most:
One of the things I really
miss about St. Bonaventure
is the Franciscan traditions
that are instilled in the uni-
versity -- meeting with the
Franciscan friars and the
Franciscan sisters and hav-
ing that sense of community
that comes with the Francis-
can tradition and education.
BACKFILE
Class Year:
2012
Major:
Journalism/Mass Communication
What I Miss the Most:
I lived in Francis Hall ...
and every day I'd walk along the bike path in
between the two different parts of campus and
I'd just be overwhelmed with a feeling of "This
is where I'm supposed to be."
"I think I would have been swallowed
up in some large mass of students. At
Bonaventure, I was a face, I was a person,
and that helped."
A small-town girl from the rural Erie
County town of Akron, Hayes admits she
was skittish about moving to New York
City when she accepted the job at the
Province.
"The transition to the city was difficult,
but it would have been even more agoniz-
ing if I didn't have the Bonaventure com-
munity here to welcome me," Hayes said.
"I was given the names of several people to
reach out to when I first got here, and they
were very, very willing ... to show me the
ropes and that made a huge difference."
But her conviction and passion about
working for the friars, whose commitment
to making the world a better place im-
pressed her while at Bonaventure, trumped
her trepidation.
"I saw their work at St. Bonaventure ...
and they were doing something that I be-
lieved in. I really respect the work that they
do," she said. "What I learned at Bonaven-
ture is that it's very important not to be pas-
sive in approaching the problems that our
society is facing. It's very important to take
an active role in changing the world."