Two recent Liberal Arts graduates from St Mary’s, Laura Bogues and Kavita Thanki, have been awarded the “Highly Commended” status by the international Undergraduate Awards programme based in Dublin. The organisation presents awards to accomplished undergraduate writers. The two will have been invited to participate in the UA Global Summit to be held in Dublin from 10-13 November featuring hundreds of other undergraduate writers from around the world. Speakers at the summit will include astrophysicist Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell, who was born and brought up in Belfast, and AC Grayling, perhaps best known as author of The Good Book: A Secular Bible. Also speaking at the awards will be Heather Cousins, Deputy Permanent Secretary of DEL(NI).

Laura and Kavita received their awards under the category of Music, Film, Theatre & Art History, and they submitted essays as part of their final-year coursework for the International Studies strand of their Liberal Arts degree. The course, entitled “Unity in Diversity”, was designed and taught by Senior Lecturer Dr Angela Vaupel, who hails from Germany and is a scholar in the fields of Cultural Studies and intercultural education. Her course focuses upon the exploration and examination of cultural identity and possible cross-currents in the diverse cultural expressions of ‘European identity’ as they are manifest in European literature and film. Dr Vaupel commented:

“Since their very first year of study in the Liberal Arts, both students showed a keen interest in the ‘Cultural Studies’ aspects of the degree programme. I am delighted about this interest being reflected in the ‘highly commended status’ of their essays. Kavita and Laura are intelligent and kind young women, and I always enjoyed working with both of them throughout their three years at St Mary’s.”

Last year, in the 2014 awards, St Mary’s BEd student Megan Turner was the recipient of an Undergraduate Award for her essay on education.