School of Athen by Raphael

Tracy Taylor: Creative Writing and Liberal Studies

Alumna Focus

Tracy graduated from Vancouver Island University in January 2010. Here's how she describes her experience in Liberal Studies.

"What I keep coming back to is that I have a shelf full of books that I may well would have read eventually but would never have understood as fully as I now do. I refer to many of them fairly often -- Sappho's fragments, Marcus Aurelius, Aristotle, and am particularly drawn to The Divine Comedy for reasons I don't understand.

"What I most appreciated about Liberal Studies was the opportunity to engage with other students in dialogue during the seminars. It's one thing to read something but being able to discuss it afterward enabled me to formulate an opinion and then to incorporate what I'd learned and understood into other aspects of my life, both at school and in the greater world. My tassled black cap goes off to Maureen Okun, who was the most patient and inclusive of seminar leaders and who tolerated my airy-fairy seminar notes with good humour and patience.

"I wouldn't hesitate to recommend Liberal Studies to anyone interested in delving into the important works of the last two thousand years in order to get a better understanding of why the western world has come to be the way it is... for better or worse."