September 22, 2015

The Dominican Star’s Editorial Board has written the following piece. Editorials contain the opinions of the members of the Editorial Board. Members include Editor-in-Chief Cory Lesniak, Managing Editor Jocelyn Cano, Sports Editor Marty Carlino, Digital Editor Sarah Tinoco, News & Features Editor Melissa Rohman and Staff Reporter Natalie Rodriguez.

Each issue of the Dominican Star will contain editorial on various trending topics. The opinions do not reflect those of Dominican University.  

Are you truly making the most out of your experience at Dominican University? School is defined as an institution where instruction is given, while education is an act of acquiring knowledge for intellectual thinking, judgment and reasoning. As students here at Dominican University, we are presented with a great number of valuable resources, experiences and opportunities that many other college students at different universities are not so fortunate to have. When discussing the possibilities of topics for our first editorial piece of the year, we as editors all agreed about the great importance of one of these experiences our university has to offer, the annual Caritas Veritas Symposium Day.

Every year, for the last 6 years, Dominican University holds its annual Caritas Veritas Symposium at the end of September. For one day only, the university cancels all regularly scheduled classes for that day in order to offer a day full of panels, presentations and interactive workshops held by some of the most knowledgeable and well studied minds our university has. From 10 a.m. till nearly 3 p.m. students can attend sessions of their choice to gain and absorb valuable information. The only instruction given at the Symposium is to sit back, relax, listen and reflect on the knowledge that we acquire from the variety of lectures and panels we attend throughout the day. There are no quizzes, no tests, no papers and no required discussion.

The range of possibilities at our disposable throughout this day is practically limitless. With over 30 different sessions throughout the day, there is something for all interests.

But there’s only one problem: we as editors noticed that what comes with this great day is a lack of student attendance, engagement and desire to be a part of this invaluable experience. There is no harm in educating ourselves to increase our intellectual judgment and reasoning, so why do students choose not to attend Caritas Veritas Symposium Day?

Now before going any further, we would like to state that this does not apply to all students. A good number of students are engaged and involved with this day, but we believe the participation for Caritas Veritas Symposium is nowhere near what it should be. Throughout our years here at Dominican, we have attended many seminars that were apart of Caritas Veritas Symposium Day in which almost half the seats in the room were left empty. When members of our editorial board have attended seminars that do draw more attendees, we’ve noticed that many of the students who are in attendance aren’t fully engaged. Whether its sitting in the back of the room scrolling through their phone, glued to their laptop screen or simply just attending in order to earn the extra credit that is offered by many professors for attending one of the day’s activities.

That said, our group of editors here at the Dominican Star cannot urge you enough to take advantage of this day and truly cherish it. Even if you only chose to attend one seminar, you won’t regret the amount of knowledge and perspective you gained from just that one session. We should be willing to open our minds to pursue love and truth on the one day that is Dominican’s Caritas Veritas Symposium Day.