Bellarmine Interviews: Student Life

By: Trey Curry, Ian Shumate, and Jacob Woods

Here at GSP, we value perspective, and that is why we decided to interview a couple of our resident advisors that actually attend Bellarmine University right now so we could hear their perspective on going to school here and campus life as a whole. The two RAs we chose to interview were Lycette Belisle and Emmanuel Fasipe, both former Governor’s Scholars and now rising seniors here at Bellarmine.

Lycette

We started the interview by allowing Lycette to introduce herself. She said that she is from Hopkinsville, Kentucky, and is double majoring in communications and theology. The first thing we talked about was what she loved about attending Bellarmine. She claimed that the school was small enough to where she could see her friends when walking to class, but not so small to where she knew everyone, so she could still meet new people. We then discussed what made her choose Bellarmine as the place to spend the next four years of her life, and she immediately started talking about how she can have real relationships with her professors here, which wouldn’t be possible at a bigger university, and that she loved that aspect when making her college decision. We then went into what she would change about Bellarmine if she had the opportunity, and she said student involvement is definitely something that needs to be changed. She claimed that a lot of students across campus don’t really participate in much and that the school really doesn’t do much to combat that. The last general thing we talked about was what made her choose communications as one of her majors. We learned that she actually chose theology first due to the fact that it just interested her, and that communications came later. She told us that her focus area at GSP was actually communication and social theory, and that communications is broad enough of a major to where she will have multiple options since she doesn’t know specifically what she wants to do after her time at Bellarmine.

We then started to discuss things more specific to just Lycette, which started with talking about her trip to the Balearic Islands to study abroad. She was there for about a month, and she thoroughly enjoyed it and said she learned a lot. She talked about how Bellarmine does an outstanding job in providing opportunities to study abroad and that you can go for anywhere between 10 days and a full academic year. We wrapped up our conversation by talking about what Bellarmine has meant to her and what advice she would give to incoming freshmen. She said that she has grown so much and that she has learned how to find the environments that she can thrive most in. She also said the most important thing she learned was when to cut something off and move on when it’s best. Her advice to incoming freshmen was this: Always have a why for everything you do. That is definitely some of the best advice anyone could ever receive, and I think it’s proven that Bellarmine can truly create some amazing people just like Lycette.

Emmanuel

Our next guest, Emmanuel Fasipe, is nothing short of a work horse. Coming from Nigeria to the U.S. in his freshman year of high school, Emmanuel was always a lover of language and he decided to further that passion once he got to college. He is currently enrolled at Bellarmine University and is majoring in both English and Communications, while balancing his heavy involvement in the Student Body, including a BU Radio Show titled “Jazz with Manny”. That’s a lot for a young adult, let alone a college student. However, Emmanuel has never been afraid of being multi-faceted and won’t allow labels to gum up his creative gears. While chatting with him, he had a big piece of advice for incoming freshmen at Bellarmine; if you want something, go get it.

As we began to discuss what drew him in to attend Bellarmine and how the university has impacted him, we found out all the things BU had to offer. As stated before, Emmanuel is heavily involved on campus, including his radio show, a role in the Student Success Leadership Board, a role in Photography Club, and many more hobbies and interests. Emmanuel described BU as a place where anything is possible for students, and a place where every student has a drive for involvement. When touring campuses, he said BU stood out to him because of the hospitality, scenery, and the scholarship opportunity, and these things inspired him to make his mark on Bellarmine. This same hospitality was a big part of his success in college. In fact, one of his favorite things about BU was the support from everyone on campus. He stated that college students sometimes feel like they have to do everything on their own, and that is the wrong way to go about it. Support systems are integral to a student’s success and Bellarmine is a great place to look.

You could use a lot of words to describe Emmanuel Fasipe. Active, curious, passionate, confident, and fearless are all great descriptors. But as a whole, Emmanuel Fasipe is a student. His majors may be English and Communications, but no degree can sum up his personality or his drive.