Festival of Student Achievement

The festival of student achievement was held on April 14, 2014. I went to the opening awards and ceremony. The opening speaker was Chris Trani. He was a former student at Rockhurst. He graduated in 2003. His speech was very interesting. He talked about how when he was a student here, he was not a high achiever. In fact, for the first two years that he was her, he was just floating through college, not really sure of what he wanted to do. He visited Mexico with Rockhurst, and it changed the course of his life. When he came back from Mexico, he had more of an idea of what he wanted to do. He felt like he was surer of what he was meant to do. So, he started picking up majors and minors left and right, because some of them were easy to get.

After he graduated, he moved to Juarez, Mexico and worked with a non for profit in Mexico, and he felt like that is where he was meant to be. He brought doctors to underserved parts of Mexico and for a week or two weeks they would do checkups for patients. One day, while he was with a doctor on a call, they were able to diagnose the child with a heart murmur. Instead of being grateful the dad was upset, because they had diagnosed his child with something, but they did not offer any type of cure for the problem. This made Chris feel like he needed to do more. That what he was doing was not enough,

                Through his work he ended up meeting another Rockhurst graduate who had graduated in ’68 and who was working on a project called American House. This is a home for undocumented immigrants. The home is open to them and provides hospitality to them. The Rockhurst graduate, who began this home, took the core value of cura personalis and walked the streets to see who the poor were and to understand better how he might be able to help. Chris helped to document the Annunciation House and helped to create the documentary called an American House which is about how the Annunciation House was started.

                At the end of his speech Chris wanted to pay it forward and told students that he had business cards and if anyone was interested in getting involved more with nonprofits then to give him a call. He really wanted to help and give back for everything that he received from Rockhurst. I thought that was really cool that he was willing to pay it forward and help out current Rockhurst students even though he might not know who they are.