Christian Student Fellowship at UK

     For this blog post I didn't use an article for research, I went and spoke to one of the leaders in CSF named Tater that I knew from a friend. I deemed him a viable source for this topic because he has been involved in CSF for six years as a student as well as a leader.

     Last Friday I saw Tater walking around campus and stopped and had a quick chat with him. During which he invited me to Friday Night Flapjacks, one of the many events put on by CSF. Before interviewing Tater I though CSF was just a group where Christians got together and prayed or volunteered. While prayer and volunteering is a big part of CSF it's far from the only things offered. First off, CSF is not only for Christians. (Confused? Me too.) According to Tater, "Anyone from Muslims to Atheists can show up to CSF and hangout or help if they choose."Also, CSF does a lot of activities off the campus as well. In a couple of weeks some of the members in CSF will be heading to a town outside of Ohio to participate in the Fall Retreat. When asked about Fall retreat, Tater was ready to explain some of the activities featured, "Basically it's a bunch of like minded people hanging out, sharing stories, and worshiping together." Some of the other events thrown by CSF that aren't as religious are Friday Night Flapjacks. At Friday Night Flapjacks you'll most likely see people you know whether or not they are religious due to the fact that the pancakes are free. Of course CSF wants you to learn about religion at some point while you're there but if you end up just getting some pancakes and hanging out it's the same to them. 

     After leaving the CSF building I thought of the organization in a whole new light. Before I thought of CSF as a typical religious group that I had seen in high school. In some regards CSF is just that, but if you look a little closer you'll see that CSF has so much more to offer than the religious aspect. Although Tater gave a great interview I was still left with the question of how a person can get involved with CSF? Is there an application or does someone just show up? I think CSF is a great topic to further research because of all the interesting activities they put on as well as showing students all the community service that they take part in. 

UK Student Center

   I chose an article about the Student Center. The article does not list an author but it was found on the University of Kentucky's web page. Therefore, I deemed it a reliable source. The article explains some of the features of the Student Center, its hours of operation, as well as directions if you're new to the campus.
   At your first year at UK, you might not have scheduled your classes particularly well and have some downtime in between classes. If so, head on down to the student center located on Euclid Avenue/Avenue of Champions or down the stairs after passing white hall. The Student Center offers students a number of activities to do while waiting for class. You can play a game of pool or table tennis. Watch TV or play video games. Or just sit at one of the many tables and chew the fat with your pals. While the Student Center has a lot of entertaining aspects to it, it also has academic areas as well. In the Student Center you can also find the UK Bookstore, some conference rooms, and the Credit Union just to name a few things. I stopped at the Student center earlier in the day on Thursday and spoke with a student named Evan Collins and asked him what he thought about the Student Center. He told me "Boy oh boy, do I sure love the Student Center! I can play all the Call of Duty I want!" Although he was the only student I talked to, judging by the amount of people in the Student Center, its safe to say that a lot of students share Evan's opinion.
   The article as well as Evan's testimonial got me thinking about focusing in on organizations run by students for students. It seems that these kind of organizations that leave the responsibility to students should be more common place around campus. A question I had after reading the article was, are there any other organizations like the student center around campus?

WRFL Radio Station

   For this blog I focused on the student radio station at UK called WRFL. The article was written on the Kentucky Kernel by Emily-Kate Cardwell, I deemed this website viable because it is a Kentucky based website and would have the resources to give information on the radio station. I also spoke to a DJ named Alisha on Wednesday. She gave me a tour of the studio and told me how things work. The article focuses   on the radio stations history, accomplishments, and some of its involvement in the community.
   In 1988 some college students got together and took an idea for a radio station to administrators and thus WRFL was born. For 26 years WRFL has been providing Lexington and surrounding areas with a unique listening experience. On WRFL, listeners tune into music that will usually not be found on stations. This is because record labels provide WRFL with records to play on the air. Fans of the station won't have to wait for a certain part of the day to hear their favorite music as WRFL broadcasts 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a years. WRFL gives students who are intent on being a DJ, having a career in broadcasting, or just want a way to get involved on campus a great opportunity to do so.
   After talking to Alisha for awhile and reading the article I was still left with some questions. First, did the University have a broadcasting/radio program for students to use while in college. If so, what was it? If not, what could the university offer students who were interested in broadcasting as a career? This article has made me want to find more organizations that are more geared toward post graduation careers. For example, are there any organizations for people wanting to get into entertainment or TV?

Air Force ROTC at UK

   For this post I used two sources. The first I used because it provided a powerful image as well as a brief passage on how the Air Force ROTC honored September 11th anniversary. The second I used because it gave a good description of Air Force ROTC. Neither provided an author but the first site was from the Herald-Leader and the second was from the official Air Force website, both of which are credible sources for the subject matter. 

   Today was the thirteen year anniversary of the September 11th attack on the twin towers, because of this, members of the Air Force ROTC program at UK set up a vigil for not only the people killed in the attacks but for the soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan since the United States put troops on the ground. The vigil started the same time as the first attack in 2001. During the vigil, members of the ROTC read off all the names of the people killed on that fateful day. Before today, I have never really taken interest in the ROTC program offered at UK. However, after seeing the dedication and honor portrayed by the students in the ROTC I thought it was only fair that I talk about the organization on my blog. 

   While the Air Force ROTC program on campus is unique in its own right, there are over 1,100 programs across the nation. The ROTC program offers students a chance to become leaders within the Air Force as officers as well as receiving a scholarship for school. 

   After reading the article about the Air Force ROTC hosting the vigil, it leaves me the question of whether or not the Army ROTC took part in a vigil of their own? Doing an article on the Air Force ROTC made me want to do an article on the Army ROTC to contrast and compare. This blog has given me a more focused look on my project and made me look more into organizations as a whole instead of just buildings. 

Ann O'Hanlon: A Brief History

     In search of another topic to blog about I thought of the activity we did in Friday's class and I thought the fresco in Memorial Hall might be a good topic to write about for my second installment on my blog. After browsing through a few sites, I found an article on the O'Hanlon Center for the Arts page that gave a brief description of the life and work of their creator, Ann O'Hanlon. The website did not name an author of the article but since the website is the official page for the Ann O'Hanlon Center for the Arts, I figured this would be as credible or more than any other source I might find.
    Ann O'Hanlon was born in Ashland, Kentucky in the year of 1908 and lived to be an astounding 90 years old, dying in 1998. Before her death, Ann lead an exciting, rewarding, and fruitful life. Through her art, Ann has inspired many and left a legacy that many can appreciate. As the oldest of five, Ann was responsible for helping her mother take care of her younger siblings while her mother tried to make extra money by selling baked goods. A little farther on down the road we get to Ann's collegiate years. She graduated from the University of Kentucky in 1932 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. She continued to pursue her education at the California School of Fine Arts. It was here that Ann would go on to meet her husband, Dick O'Hanlon. Ironically, both Ann and Dick have left a lasting mark at their respective colleges by helping create frescos at them. Dick's can be found at the San Francisco Art Institute and Ann's (as you probably already know) can be found at the University of Kentucky. Ann's fresco depicts the history of Kentucky in a manner unlike other artists. She paints the whole picture by showing the good and bad sides of Kentucky's past. In 1936 Ann and Dick moved east to work in various places such as New York and Philadelphia. In 1942 Ann and Dick moved to California and bought a farm to work on their art. This same farm was eventually converted into the O'Hanlon Center for the Arts which can still be visited today.
     After reading this article, I'm left with a few questions about Ann's life. One, was Ann's father out of the picture as a child? The article only tells of the mother. Second, are there any other works of art by Ann at the University? I think it would be interesting to see if the University has collected any of her other works. This article will be able to help me develop an idea of what part of the campus I want to focus on for the shark tank project. Focusing on areas that have been touched or are related to Ann could only lead to a great amount of information.

Commonwealth Stadium

     I found an article in the reference section in a wikipedia article, the actual article I read and have used can be found at http://www.ukathletics.com/athletic-dept/commonwealth-stadium.html The article does not have a posted author but I believe it to be credible because it is on the official UK athletics page. The title of the article is fittingly "Commonwealth Stadium". 

     The article explains the history of the stadium and its improvements over the years since its conception. It was built in 1973 by a firm by the name of Huber, Hunt, and Nichols after the Kentucky Wildcats had played at the old stadium known as McLean Stadium for 48 years. Originally, the stadium featured 57,800 seats and had no protection from the elements. Although the new stadium came with a whopping $12 million dollar bill, the argument could be made that the new stadium gave the Wildcats an extra boost on the field as the Wildcats have a 52.9% win percentage at home. 

     After playing on the new Commonwealth Stadium field 26 years, it was decided that the Wildcats needed to update Commonwealth. The price for this job would end up being somewhere in the ballpark of $27.6 million. Some of the additions to the stadium included adding a little under 10,000 seats, a new scoreboard, and some more restrooms. Ironically, a construction company based in Ohio helped with job. Since the expansion the Wildcats have enjoyed an average of 56,527 fans attending games and over 12 million total. 

     This article not only brought up the realization that the University of Kentucky puts astronomical amounts of money into their athletics and gives the athletes every opportunity to succeed. With that, it also raises some questions, how big is the return on investment for the university? WIth all the talk of NCAA should pay athletes, the idea of the University investing so much money into the athletes just to help them can't be the case.