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-Courtney Phelan | Wednesday, January 18, 2017
Couples on Valentine’s Day are expected to exchange gifts. I don’t want to spend a lot of space in this column arguing that roses and heart-shaped boxes of chocolates are unnecessary, so here: those cliché roses are unsustainably farmed and shipped in from 3000 miles away, those cliché greeting cards are overpriced and impersonal, and
Courtney Phelan | Wednesday, December 7, 2016
Students today are reading more than ever before. While they are not necessarily curling up with “War and Peace” in front of a roaring fireplace every night, they are reading. It’s just that what we’re reading isn’t what we’re used to. According to a 2015 Common Sense Media report, teenagers and young adults spend about
Courtney Phelan | Wednesday, November 16, 2016
It’s officially halfway through November, which means that it’s close enough to Christmas for me to get excited without sounding too insane. I love and cherish Christmas, and excitedly wait for it every year. However, I am not one of those people from department store commercials who purchase new Christmas sweaters each year and mutilate
Courtney Phelan | Wednesday, November 2, 2016
This summer, I took a theology course at Notre Dame. It was an introduction to Christian theology and started with the very basics: what is theology, what is God, how do we study theology, etc. One of the first things we learned is also one of the things that’s stuck with me the most. Our
Courtney Phelan | Wednesday, October 12, 2016
In a tape released by the Washington Post earlier this week, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and TV host Billy Bush had a conversation about women. The tape’s release has caused significant backlash in the media and on social media, as well as in the Republican party. Prominent Republicans John McCain, John Kasich and Paul
Courtney Phelan | Wednesday, September 14, 2016
You’re a few weeks into this college thing and you’re feeling overwhelmed. Maybe you’re feeling lonely and like everyone else already has more friends. Maybe you’re feeling the opposite of lonely, like you’re surrounded by people you don’t know and you don’t like and you don’t know how to get away from them. Maybe you’re
Courtney Phelan | Wednesday, August 31, 2016
Every student in all three campuses is currently working toward some type of professional career or post-graduate “thing.” As much as we might want to live in the undergrad bubble, communicating solely through varied grunting noises and Snap Stories, someday you’ll have communicate professionally with someone. And that professional someone uses email. Sending an email or sounds
Courtney Phelan | Thursday, April 7, 2016
Starting in 2012, most of the United States adopted the Common Core State Standards. CCSS, or the Common Core, as it’s commonly (pun totally intended) called is a set of educational standards, or learning targets, that aim to ensure all students have the same expectations and opportunities. They’re rather controversial and misunderstood, and I’m not going to put myself
Courtney Phelan | Thursday, March 17, 2016
Every student has had that one English teacher who seemed to hate everything on this planet except Shakespeare and BBC documentaries about Shakespeare. This cranky Anglophile professor likes to tell students that whatever they read is not “real literature,” that their music is not “real music” and often, that they way they speak is “wrong.” The “CRAP” (CRanky Anglophile
Courtney Phelan | Friday, February 26, 2016
Whenever someone asks me where I go to school, I have a minor existential crisis. I love Saint Mary’s College. That’s not the problem. The problem is that I have to respond, “Saint Mary’s College. It’s the University of Notre Dame’s sister school, in South Bend, Indiana.” Since many people aren’t familiar with SMC, and since I always talk too