The Woods

By Anna Spydell
Staff Writer

Many Woodsies probably recall the experience of visiting college campuses during their high school years. It’s likely they remember the first time they set foot on Saint Mary-of-the-Woods campus.
On Friday, Nov. 11, SMWC students got to see it from the other side as high schoolers visited the Woods to see if, perhaps, they too might become Woodsies.
With an eye to introducing potential students to the campus of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College, Campus Life kicked off Campus Visit Day that afternoon with registration and a meet-and-greet.
With an RSVP list of more than 30 prospective students, including seven soccer recruits, the faculty had their hands full for a big day ahead.
“It was really a partnership between Elizabeth [Coley], Nicolette Cisarik, and I,” said Jeff Malloy, dean of Student Life at SMWC.
While Malloy’s role centered around coordinating the housing and hostesses for the visitors, it certainly wasn’t all that needed to be done.
Assistant Director of Student Engagement Nicolette Cisarik made sure that the visiting students were kept well amused.
“I planned the entertainment for the evening and helped host the events that night,” said Cisarik.
While Campus Visit Days aren’t new, this year was a little different.
With interested high school students arriving on campus Friday morning, Campus Life hosted events for the potential students during the day. From 6 p.m. until 8 p.m., the events ranged from a “photo booth,” manicures and pedicures, turns playing the campus’s ever-popular Wii, and a performace by mentalist Sean Bott.
However, for the first time in four years, after the events were over, the prospective students stayed overnight with student hostesses.
Student Krista Rangel served as one of the hostesses for the event.
“Some of my duties as a host were to make sure that the overnight guest was comfortable, make them feel at home, and answer any questions they might have about the school,” said Rangel. “It was really nice to talk with the prospective students and realize how much we had in common.”
“You’re getting a more immersive experience,” said Malloy. “They get to know the students and the campus.”
Assistant Director of Campus Life Elizabeth Coley emphasized the importance of the event.
“Enrollment is key to the future success of SMWC. Not only enrollment, but to make sure we are finding the best students for our institution,” said Coley. “Having an overnight visit like this, we give students the best opportunity to see the Woods, what it really looks and feels like and authentic conversation with current students.”
With attracting future enrollment being an important part of keeping a college alive and relevant, the Campus Life faculty and student hostesses played an important part in bringing the Class of 2016 to SMWC with Campus Visit Day.

Popularity: 25% [?]

By Anna Spydell
Staff Writer

Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College lost a longtime staple of its community this month when Sister Ruth Eileen Dwyer, known affectionately to her colleagues as “Ruthie”, passed away on Oct. 7 at the age of 86.
Born in Chicago, on Oct. 19, 1925, Dwyer grew up attending parochial schools for both her elementary and secondary education before taking her vows Aug.15, 1946.
She held a degree in business from SMWC, a master’s of theology from St. Xavier, and a doctor of ministry from St. Mary of the Lake University.
At the Woods, she served as a professor of theology and the Vice President of Academic Affairs, among a variety of other administrative positions from 1967 to 2004.
One of her former colleagues, English professor and soccer coach, Mike Aycock, characterized her as being “full of energy and optimism”, and recalled this anecdote about Dwyer:
“I once asked her advice on who we might be able to get as a guest speaker on the topic of student development. She didn’t hesitate to suggest that I call the person many considered the foremost authority in the U.S., Arthur Chickering, and ask if he would spend some time consulting with us. Armed with her confidence, I called. He rearranged his schedule, came to spend a few days at the Woods, and invited us to be part of a larger study of adult learners. I learned a valuable lesson about expecting the best.”
In addition to being a valued colleague and sometimes mentor to her coworkers, many knew her also as a friend.
“Ruthie was always just a good friend to everyone and a true leader on this campus,” said business professor DJ Wasmer. “[I] miss her a lot.”
Previously having resided at Woodland Inn, Dwyer was moved to Mother Theodore Hall as her health declined.
Mass of Christian burial was celebrated on Oct. 14.
She is survived by her younger sister, Claudette, and her younger brother, David and she leaves behind a legacy of leadership at the Woods that will be remembered for years to come.
“Sister Ruth Eileen embodied the principal that every person should undertake the kind of spiritual exploration that theology could provide,” stated Aycock. “Her life as a teacher, scholar, administrator, and more exemplified a remarkable balance of faith and intellectual life. It remains a beacon for me.”

Popularity: 17% [?]

By Anna Spydell
Staff Writer

One might traditionally think that the path to a career in television news lies through a degree in journalism and many years establishing oneself through internships and smaller jobs within the industry.
You probably wouldn’t guess that a job as a producer for “Good Morning, America,” a writer and director for Barbara Walters and Bill O’Reilly, or roaming the African wild for the Travel Channel would come after earning a degree in philosophy and history, and holding down jobs as diverse as working as a temp to working with Arabian horses.
But for writer, editor, producer and a short time Woodsie, Mellen O’Keefe, that’s exactly how it happened.
“Providence” was a word that O’Keefe came up more than once during her visit to the Woods.
From the unlikely path her career ultimately took, from landing a job working as the secretary for a television producer to eventually becoming one herself, at her luncheon on Nov. 2, O’Keefe said that she had always thought her career had happened in a strange sort of way.
In her presentation, O’Keefe had included a slide depicting a memento from Foley Hall which her mother had given to her, inscribed with “Providence always finds a way.”
Looking up at it, O’Keefe remarked, “I never really knew what that meant, ‘providence’. Then today, I thought, ‘Oh! Maybe this is providence.’”
O’Keefe comes from a family with a long history with the Woods.
Returning to the Woods for the first time in almost 30 years, O’Keefe marveled while standing in Le Fer ballroom before a collection of faculty and students.
“[My family] probably stood in this same room!” she exclaimed.   “That’s just crazy to me!”

Photo by: Colleen Daum/ The Woods

Altogether, she counts eight Woodsies in her mother’s side of the family, including her grandmother, her mother, and her aunt.
“When I saw her career story, I thought ‘This woman is amazing!” said April Simma, director of Major and Planned Gifts at the Woods.
After receiving O’Keefe’s impressive and quirky resume after a tip from a New York-based Woodsie, Simma passed the resume on to President Dottie King.
It was then that King, on a trip to NYC, extended the invitation for O’Keefe to make her return to the Woods.
Perhaps no one was more excited about O’Keefe’s appearance than the Journalism department.
After O’Keefe attended one of her classes as a guest speaker during her stay, Assistant Professor of Media Studies Elaine Yaw said, “Having her in the class was great because she has been a writer, an editor, and a producer for a really long time. Just having her perspective has been really interesting. We get a lot of access to reporters, but not a lot of access to producers, and they’re the ones really pulling it all together.”
Assistant Professor of Journalism Lori Henson agreed.
“It’s generally true that, in TV anyway, reporters are the ones who get the most attention, but it’s the producers who are behind the scenes, making the whole thing come together,” Henson said.
Yaw added, “I think for journalism students to see the whole process from beginning to end is really great.”
The wide range of information that O’Keefe had to share ran the broad gamut from discussing copyright issues and issues of legality with journalism classes, to her discomfort at being assigned sensationalist stories at Inside Edition, to finally talking in depth at her advocacy work she has done on behalf of inclusive education for children with disabilities in the New York public school system.
“She has so much to say and you don’t want to interrupt her because it’s such good information,” said Henson.
From journalism students to faculty, both ‘An Evening with Mellen O’Keefe’ on Nov. 1st and the RSVP Luncheon on Nov. 2nd were full of people eager to hear the unique stories and first-hand experiences that O’Keefe had to share.
“To be here, with my girls and my family,” said O’Keefe, referencing several of her fellow former Woodsies who had joined her for a reunion of sorts, “It’s just incredible.”
The Woods was equally glad to welcome O’Keefe home for a week.

Popularity: 21% [?]

By Anna Spydell &
Lacey Henson
Staff Writers

Freshman Alexis Dawson received a spooky welcome shortly after moving in to her room, number 247 in Le Fer Hall.
“I was on Skype and a picture that was on the wall went flying across the room,” Dawson recalled. “And one day I was in the shower and I heard people in my room moving things around. When I got out, I couldn’t find my laptop or tennis shoes.”
Suspecting that a friend had dropped by her room while she was in the shower, Dawson went to the door to ask if anyone had seen her things.
“I realized that my door had been locked the entire time and there had been no way to get into my room,” Dawson said.
As fall approaches, colors of orange, crimson and yellow paint the leaves of the trees surrounding the beautiful campus of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods.
But with stories about the faceless nun, a bloodstained room, footsteps throughout Le Fer, mysterious piano playing in the Conservatory and underground tunnels, it seems that the SMWC campus has a dark, underlying history.
With all of the startling stories, myths, and folklores that trace back to the SMWC campus, why travel to a haunted house this year to get your spook on?
The SMWC campus has plenty of its own spooks to offer that might make your blood run cold.
Take, for example, the legend of the Faceless Nun.
Possibly the most famous of the Woods ghosts, her notoriety has landed SMWC in ghost hunting books, such as Haunted Halls: Ghostlore of American College Campuses by Elizabeth Tucker, published by University Press of Mississippi in 2007.
While stories concerning her identity conflict with each other, they do seem to agree on the long gone Foley Hall as the site of her haunting.
Foley Hall was razed in 1989, leaving no physical place to visit to investigate the ghost.
“A fire burned it out on the inside, and after that it was just torn down,” said SMWC security guard, Albert Heramb.
Formerly located between the Conservatory and O’Shaughnessy, Foley Hall housed art classrooms on its upper levels.
It is to those classrooms that the Faceless Nun is most popularly attached.
Her tales vary; she is alternately described as a terrifying faceless entity who would wail along Foley’s halls and as a realistic looking-figure who would always appear between the viewer and the light, the glare obscuring her face.

Photo by Jade Scott/ The Woods

These tales, many of which are recounted on the Sisters of Providence’s website, describe her as so realistic that people would believe her to be one of the flesh and blood Sisters.  They would speak to her, never suspecting her ghostly nature until she would simply vanish.
Immediately next door to the former site of Foley Hall stands the Conservatory.
Housing both the Theater department and the Music department, the Conservatory has both the auditorium and the practice rooms.
Some of those rooms are equipped with pianos for the music students to work in.
“Back when I first started at this job, I was patrolling the Conservatory and getting ready to lock up,” Heramb said. “All of a sudden, I heard piano music.”
Thinking perhaps a music student was having a late night practice session, Heramb made his way upstairs to inform the student that he was about to lock up for the night.
“But when I reached the second floor, the music stopped,” he said.  “I looked around, and no one was there.”
Not knowing what to make of it, Heramb returned to the ground floor.
“As soon as I left the second floor, the music began again,” he said.
Heramb then radioed for another security guard to meet him at the Conservatory and, together, they combed the Conservatory for any trace of their piano-playing quarry.
“We never found anyone,” said Heramb.
The intrigue doesn’t stop at the above-ground area of the Conservatory. Beneath lies a large basement, filled with furniture, props, and one of the several entryways to SMWC’s network of underground tunnels.
The underground tunnels are no myth. There are tunnels that run under the ground that connect all of the buildings on the campus side as well as the sisters’ side. Most campuses have underground tunnels and even many buildings in Terre Haute.
“They are used for maintenance purposes,” Utilities Manager for the Sisters of Providence, Bob Flesher, said.

Photo by Jade Scott/ The Woods

The tunnels run steam to Le Fer for hot water and to also heat other buildings. Electrical lines and cables are also run in some tunnels to the library for IT usage.
“They keep lines accessible and allow for easy repair,” Flesher said.
Standing six by four feet, most are walkable. However, some are so small that a person would have to crawl through. Some have been closed off and are not in use.
The tunnels are lighted but still have an eerie feel.
“Some of the guys have seen shadows while in the tunnels,” Flesher said. “You can tell that they are a little spooked, even though they don’t like to admit it.”
Students have reported experiencing unexplainable activity in the Le Fer Hall dormitories.
Freshman Jessica Rodriguez has seen some pretty strange things since moving in to the second floor of the south wing of Le Fer.
Rodriguez said, “Every night, between twelve and four, if you’re really quiet, you will see a shadow moving from end to end of the hallway.”
From mysterious piano music in the Conservatory, to strange noises in Le Fer, students and staff alike have reported strange incidents across the campus of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College.
While there remains no evidence beyond personal accounts to confirm any unknown presences on campus, it is likely that ghost stories concerning SMWC will continue to be handed down from Woodsie to Woodsie.

Popularity: 36% [?]

By Anna Spydell
Staff Writer

They’re almost a school mascot.
You’ve probably seen them around campus: bounding alongside the equine majors on their walk out to the barn; hanging around the entrances to Hulman, hoping for a pat; sprawled at the feet of President Dottie King as she gives an interview to the local news on the front porch of Guerin.
Assistant Director of Campus Life Elizabeth Coley had an unexpected office visit from one of the canines over the summer.
“I was working in my office, and I kept thinking, ‘What is that noise?’”, Coley recalled with a laugh. “I walked around, and Bo was lying there in front of my desk! I was like ‘Okay, I enjoy the company, but you can’t be here!’”
The “Woods dogs” seem to be a warm, friendly, floppy presence on campus and beloved by students and faculty alike.
Freshman equine major Paige Harvey spoke fondly of the dogs, saying, “I love having the dogs around because I miss my dog from home a lot. It’s comforting when they’re around because you get your dog time.”
“Bo is the yellow one with the curly tail, and he has an owner that lives right across the street”, said Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College and Sisters of Providence security guard, George Pizzola. “This is his second home.”
But that isn’t the story with all the dogs.
“Some of them may be strays,” said Pizzola.
A few weeks ago, a rumor circulated campus that security would be removing the dogs, news that upset many students.
When asked about the rumors, Pizzola confirmed that security had thought about it concerning one dog.
“There was an older female dog hanging around, and we considered removing her. But the last I heard one of the students was talking about taking her home. I don’t know if that ended up working out or not,” reported Pizzola.
Paige Harvey was able to confirm that particular dog’s fate.
“The old girl that I called Princess was taken home by Caitlin Thompson. All of the horse girls loved her and she had water and whatever food we could find for her there. The dogs don’t bother the horses and I haven’t seen any bad reactions from either of the animals, which I was scared about at first.”
It seems clear that most of the student body feels affectionately towards the animals.
“It’s mostly people who come here for wedding receptions and things like that who see them and get scared,” said Pizzola, adding. “And ultimately, we work for the Sisters of Providence. Our paychecks come from them. So we have to do what the Sisters want us to do about the dogs.”
When asked where the dogs would be taken should removal become necessary, Pizzola said.
“Taking the dogs to the pound would be the last plan of action. We’d probably take them to the Vermillion Humane Society to increase their chances of being adopted.”

Popularity: 24% [?]

By Anna Spydell
Staff Writer

Photo by Anna Spydell/ The Woods

Living in the hollows of trees, constructed bat houses or, more rarely, caves, they range in size from a few inches tall to over a foot, depending on the species. Black or brown in color, they have long, spindly wing bones with stretched membranes between them to help them fly. Their bodies are furry and their tiny faces are inquisitive. Nocturnal hunters, a single bat can eat thousands of insects a night and emits barely audible, high-pitched squeaks.
There may not be a more misunderstood animal than the bat.
Associated with vampires and Halloween, the winged mammal gets a bad rep in Western society. On Aug. 27, the creators of the Fifth Annual Bat Festival set out to change that.
With a team comprised of bat biologists, naturalists, conservationists, and volunteers, the event aimed to present the public with facts about the winged mammal, some species of which are now endangered.
“The main objective of the festivals are to educate kids, the general public and teachers about bats and why we should help them to survive, and dispel the myths about bats,” said Indiana State biology professor Dr. John Whitaker, one of the festival’s founders.
Indiana is no stranger to bats. We share the Wabash Valley with four different species of bats alone, with many more living within the state.
They eat irritating undesirables such as mosquitoes by the thousands each night, as well as rootworms that threaten our agriculture.
According to Bats Conservation International bat populations are declining almost everywhere. The loss of these mammals could have devestating consequences for local ecosystesms.
Focusing on outreach and conservation, the festival sought to teach people more about bats, the important role they play in the environment and why humans shouldn’t fear them.
From 10 a.m. till 5 p.m., the public packed into the Indiana State University’s Science Building for live and silent auctions, bat merchandise and demonstrations with both live bats and birds of prey, as well as face painting and an inflatable cave for little ones.
“We have produced six brochures about bats and they are free to the public. Each year at the festival, we introduce another booklet in our ‘Bats of…’ series.  In 2007, it was ‘Bats of Indiana’, then Michigan, Missouri, Ohio and Kansas.  Next year it will be ‘Bats of Pennsylvania,’” Whitaker said.

Popularity: 25% [?]