Russell
Lowery-Hart, associate professor of speech communication and chair of
the committee that oversees the program, reads Bronson’s book.
(Canyon)—When Monty Trimble won the Readership WT Essay Contest, it was additional proof that the common-readership program at West Texas A&M University is working even better than expected.
Dubbed Readership WT, the program is designed for freshmen; Trimble is a junior applied arts and sciences major.
Readership WT was established in the summer of 2005 to give freshmen a shared experience as they transition to the university environment, but staff, faculty and students of every classification took time to read the book. All students are eligible to participate in the essay contest, which has a $250 first-place prize.
“The whole campus became involved in the program, not just the freshmen,” said Russell Lowery-Hart, chairman of the university’s Quality Enhancement Plan Committee, which spearheads the effort.
Readership WT uses one specially selected book to help ease the transition of incoming freshmen to the university environment and develop in them a lifelong love of learning and reading that will bolster academic success. Among criteria for selecting the book is that the author is living and potentially able to speak at Freshman Convocation in September.
That book for the program’s inaugural year was chosen following an intensive study of more than 70 possible titles that were solicited by the program’s book committee. The 16-member committee comprising faculty, staff, students and members of the community first whittled the list to 10 semifinalists, then to three.
The president made the final decision: A Hope in the Unseen: An American Odyssey from the Inner City to the Ivy League, a 1998 national best-seller by Washington, D.C., author and journalist Ron Suskind. It is based on a series of articles Suskind wrote for the Wall Street Journal that resulted in his winning the 1995 Pulitzer Prize for feature writing.
Copies of the book are distributed to all incoming freshmen each summer at New Student Orientations and Buff Branding. Full-time university employees receive copies, as well.
Not only did Suskind agree to speak about the book at Freshman Convocation last fall, so did the subject of the book, Jennings.
Students
enjoying the book outside the Classroom Center. At the forefront is Marlie
Black, a mass communication-public relations major from Muleshoe.
The book also is incorporated into general education courses and the Honors Program each year.
“When Cedric Jennings came and talked to us about his life experiences, it was like we already knew him,” Saneea Almas, then a freshman and a member of the Honors Program, said. “It was really a thrill. The book was discussed in every class I had last year; it’s something a group of strangers can suddenly have in common.
“Not everybody liked the book as much as I did, but we talked about that, too.”
This year, the book is What Should I Do with My Life? by Po Bronson, a nonfiction chronicle of introspection and the journeys people take to discover their true calling.
A lawyer who became a priest and a real estate agent who opened a leather crafts factory in Costa Rica are two of dozens of extraordinary profiles.
Bronson has agreed to speak at the university’s Freshman Convocation Sept. 8.
“The main question students have when they enter college is, ‘What am I going to be?”’ Lowery-Hart said. “I understand Mr. Bronson is a very dynamic speaker and should add to the process as our students attempt to define their life missions. “If you want to get everyone on the same page, give them the same book.”
What Should I Do with My Life? was inspired by Bronson’s own search for meaning. After its hardcover release in 2002, the book was on the New York Times bestseller list for 22 weeks.
Bronson has written for New York Times Magazine, the Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, and Wired. He graduated from Stanford University with a B.A. in economics and from San Francisco State University with a master’s degree in creative writing.
“I love this program,” said Lowery-Hart. “It’s
about students being more engaged with other students, with faculty and
with staff. It’s working even better than we first envisioned it
would.” 