How we got here

By Dan Kramer

“My parents forced me to come to Franciscan.”

“I’ve always wanted to come to F.U.S.”

“I don’t know why I’m here.”

For some students, their journey at Franciscan begins with a mandate from their parents. Other students who long for a Christ-centered atmosphere feel a deep calling to enroll at Franciscan University of Steubenville. Yet still, there are students who don’t know how or even why they are working for a degree here. These are just three of the many inspiring stories about how we got here.

Megan Smolenski, a graduate counseling student and Connecticut native, entered her senior year at Bacon Academy, her local public high school, with a promising future. She had been to several Franciscan youth conferences over her high school career, yet she had no aspirations to attend the university. Smolenski was offered a full scholarship to Eastern Connecticut State with a promise of acceptance into the graduate biology program at Yale. However, she was leaning toward Salve Regina University, where she had received a noteworthy scholarship package and which had been her dream school since junior year.

Over the course of senior year, she was constantly bombarded with youth group friends, one boy in particular, urging her to enroll at Franciscan. At first she quietly dismissed these ideas, but as the year went on the suggestions started to stick in her mind. In May of her senior year, Smolenski mailed in deposits to both Franciscan and Salve Regina. She couldn’t figure out why she suddenly had a desire to attend Franciscan, but she wasn’t going to let her dream of Salve slip away.

After graduating Smolenski knew she needed to decide on a school, but she just couldn’t. She would email each school multiple times confirming her enrollment then soon after would send an email saying she was no longer sure about her status. Finally, at the end of June she made her decision. Still not understanding what was driving her, she decided to commit to Franciscan.

“It was the best decision I could have made,” Smolenski said. “If I didn’t come here, I would have never gone to Austria, I would have never been a Lamb, and I would have never met Tim.”

Smolenski is scheduled to receive her master’s degree next spring. She is engaged to senior Tim Messenger and they are getting married in July.

Senior Jonathan Cardinal graduated high school in 2007 and enrolled at the University of North Texas for music performance. He enjoyed freshmen year in the large school environment and the many opportunities offered to him. He kept himself busy during the week with his music commitments and his weekends were filled with parties.
During Jonathan’s third semester at Texas, he became discontent with how his life was progressing. His musical career was consuming more and more of his life. Each day consisted of four hours of practicing the French Horn, four hours of symphony rehearsal and two hours of music theory classes. In addition, he had grown weary of the party scene. He decided to make a change.

He was aware of Franciscan because of the summer youth conferences and scheduled a visit in November 2008. During his visit, he found that he greatly disliked the small, close-knit university. He said it was bland and he could find nothing in common with anyone. Despite the disappointing visit, Jonathan decided Franciscan was the place where he would reinvent himself. He transferred in the spring of 2009 and has not looked back since. Jonathan switched majors from music performance to catechetics and theology and is now preparing to be a youth minister. Meanwhile, he has not completely abandoned his musical aspirations but refocused them to guitar, bass and vocals, and you can occasionally hear his talents at a coffeehouse.

Senior Abigail Reno said much of her story parallels the story of Peter getting out of the boat and walking on water to Jesus. Despite her deep desire to come to Franciscan, she respected her parents’ mandate and enrolled at St. Thomas Aquinas on a full scholarship. She studied theology at St. Thomas for three semesters but never lost her desire to earn a degree at Franciscan.

In January of 2009, Reno flew to Florida to see her friend, Cara Palsis, a new transfer to Franciscan, and help her drive to Steubenville and get settled. While in Florida, she continued to pester her family about transferring, but this time it was a success. Her dad finally gave the transfer his approval. However, her family wouldn’t give her the same financial support as at they did when she was at Aquinas.

Reno immediately called Franciscan and requested admission for the spring semester, which was starting in less than a week. Miraculously, there was spot available. The only problem was finding a way to afford the tuition. Reno left with Palsis for Franciscan trying to trust that the Lord would take care of her and help her find the money she needed.
Reno arrived at Franciscan and went through orientation still not knowing how everything was going to work. As the week went on she tried to stay positive and continued to remember St. Peter and his faith which allowed him to walk on water.

Friday was the last day that could go by before she had to make a decision. She either had to go home and back to St. Thomas or find the money. That evening, she received a call from admissions saying there was a man who had heard about her story and wanted to talk to her.

The man, who wishes to remain nameless, wanted to pay Reno’s tuition, not only for that semester but for every semester she stayed at Franciscan. Her dream had come true.

“Miracle is the only way I can describe it,” said Reno. “My prayers were answered.”

Reno’s miraculous donor mailed the check that Friday and classes began on Monday.