Seven students make Lipscomb history

Seven students make Lipscomb history

Out of the seven Lipscomb students who were nominated for the Fulbright Scholar Program, all seven have gone on to become semi-finalists. In the past, the highest number of Lipscomb students to achieve Fulbright semi-finalist status in one year was one. This year, all seven nominated Lipscomb students or recent graduates were accepted as semi-finalists into Fulbright, which is a prestigious international exchange program sponsored by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Dr. Paul Prill, Lipscomb’s Fulbright program adviser and director of the Honors College, said this recognition was unusual for “a school like Lipscomb,” since most Fulbright Program finalists come from larger universities, like the University of Michigan and Cornell University. “This is unprecedented for Lipscomb,” Prill said. “It’s really good for Lipscomb to be able to point to the academic success the students are having.” One of the semi-finalists, Lipscomb senior Maribeth Beyer, shared her thoughts on what this means for her and Lipscomb. “We’re not Yale, Harvard [or] Vanderbilt, but we are moving up,” said Beyer, adding, “and any opportunity I have to take Lipscomb further than Nashville is an incredible opportunity for me.” According to Dr. Prill, Fulbright applicants have about a five percent chance of becoming a semi-finalist, and semi-finalists have approximately a 30 to 50 percent chance of becoming a finalist. Once accepted into the program, Fulbright scholars will have the opportunity to live in a country of their choosing, either as an English teaching assistant, a researcher or a student, for approximately one year, depending on the program and grant. Bigger countries, like Spain and Germany, often...

Rebecca Burris combines love for serving, teaching for spring break mission trip

Senior education major Rebecca Burris will return to Cozumel, Mexico for her fourth spring break to serve the orphans at City of Angels. The City of Angels is a Christian children’s home where young children who have been orphaned, abandoned or abused can find a permanent home. Originally from Mitchell, Indiana, Burris had not heard of the City of Angels until she arrived at Lipscomb. The missions fair introduced her to the opportunity. “I went to the info meeting and as I heard more about it, I realized I would love to go on this trip,” Burris said. As an education major, Burris was naturally attracted to the trip because of the emphasis put on spending time with children. “It’s a super laid back trip,” she said. “We do VBS two days and ESL [English as second language] classes two days and the last day is carnival day.” After her first trip, she decided to get more involved as a student leader. “Mark Jent is the leader and he asked me to be a student leader [my sophomore year] so I started doing that and I’ve been that ever since, so I have gotten to be a little more involved each year,” she said. Burris has had a hand in planning the VBS portion of the trip for the last two years. Her and the team spend time teaching, singing and doing arts and crafts. This year Burris will be playing a new role on the trip, though. “This is my first year to be on the [ESL] group,” she said. “We will be giving them English vocabulary words and Mad Libs...