FIRST YEAR RESOURCES

• First Year Reading Program
• About the Book
• Discussion Questions
• View the video Run

To honor the 100th anniversary of co-education at Marquette University, the Manresa Project has chosen Persepolis I: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi as the text for the 2009 First Year Reading Program. Persepolis, an illustrated novel, details the author’s early years growing up in Iran, the country’s religious and political conflicts, and the one family’s sacrifices to ensure an education for their daughter.

The First Year Reading Program encourages all incoming first-year students to read a common text and discuss it with a small group of fellow students, led by a faculty member and student leader, during New Student Orientation in August. Persepolis is the eighth book chosen for the program and was preceded by The Chosen by Chaim Potok (2002), A Hope in the Unseen by Ron Suskind (2003), Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott (2004), A Lesson Before Dying by Earnest J. Gaines (2005), Hunger by Lan Samantha Chang (2006), Bombingham by Anthony Grooms (2007), and Run by Ann Patchett (2008).

The First Year Reading Program is part of Marquette University's Manresa Project. Funded by a $2 million grant from the Lilly Endowment, Inc., the Manresa Project focuses on "vocation," a word that comes from the Latin word meaning "to call." The intent of the Project is to help students to listen to the deepest desires of their hearts and to hear where God is drawing them. Although the Manresa Project includes public lectures, faculty workshops, and student retreats, a major component of the project is the First Year Reading Program. Inspired by a desire to bring faculty, administrators, and students together outside of a formal classroom, the reading and discussion aim to help students begin the life-long process of finding meaning in their lives. The First Year Reading Program hopes to:

• Provide new students with a common educationally purposeful experience that will set the tone for the community by creating a comfortable, safe environment that is conducive to learning.
• Provide new students with an opportunity to explore their gifts and talents and how they might use those gifts and talents to serve others.
• Provide new students with an opportunity to begin exploring new perspectives and ways of viewing the world.
  

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Women's Leadership Conference Welcomes Susan Douglas

The 2009 Women's Leadership Conference will pose the question "Are We There Yet?" and look at leadership in a variety of topics including religion, civics, communications, and science. The conference is open to ALL Marquette students. For a peek at last year's conference, which featured singer and songwriter Christine Kane, click here.