Wednesday, May 6, 2009

DSPT Graduates Continue Their Studies

DSPT is proud to report on several of our graduates who will be continuing their studies in Master’s and Doctoral programs across the country, many of whom received generous offers of financial support from their departments!

Sarah Ball, BA Philosophy, was accepted into the MA program in the Philosophy Department at the Catholic University of America. She plans to focus on Ancient and Modern Continental Philosophy, but because CUA specializes mostly in Medieval and Ancient Philosophy, she is planning on building a foundation in Ancient before continuing on for her PhD. She was attracted to CUA because of the Department’s interest in the history of philosophy. Many of her tutors from St. John’s (where she attended before transferring to DSPT to complete her BA) received PhDs in Philosophy from CUA, so she knew beforehand that they were not overly analytic in their approach. She is also interested in CUA as a faithful Catholic college and was awarded a half-tuition scholarship to attend.

Eiyad al-Kutubi, MA Philosophy, was accepted into a PhD program at Indiana University, Bloomington, in the Near Eastern Languages and Culture Department. The School has a very impressive reputation and was rated as one of the top five programs in Islamic Studies in the U.S. He is most excited to have the opportunity to work with Professor John Walbridge, who is quite well known for his works on Islamic philosophy, and plans to continue his research on Mulla Sadra’s philosophy. He has received an offer of financial support from the university and expects to hear the details of that offer soon.

Elissa McCormack, MA Theology, was accepted into the PhD program in Historical Theology at Saint Louis University. She plans to study the Catholic Church in seventeenth-century France, continuing the research on Jansenism and Gallicanism that she started at DSPT, and maybe expanding a bit into the history of the Jesuits. She is excited about this program because they emphasize both theological methods and historiographical methods, so there is a focus on the historical contexts for developments in theology. They also just hired two new people who do work in seventeenth-century France and have a full professor who studies Gallicanism, Ultramontanism, and Papal Infallibility in the context of Vatican I who is very interested in her research in the seventeenth century. She was offered a full fellowship, which includes full tuition and a stipend.

Heidi Thimann, GTU MA Theology, is now a first-year doctoral student in the GTU Art and Religion program. Her area of specialization is late medieval art, with a particular interest in gender issues and books of hours for aristocratic French women. She credits DSPT with inspiring her to continue her studies in medieval art.