Duquesne Media student’s photo exemplifies university’s mission

By Anthony Priore, second year graduate student in the Media Arts and Technology program

“Duquesne serves God serving students.”

The first words in the university’s mission statement. The words students who come to the Bluff hear from the day they first reach campus to the moment they receive their diploma. The words that shape how young adults interact with their settings and impact others. These words summarize the culture for every student who have been impacted by faculty, staff, and fellow students with the idea they will carry on the tradition long after they have graduated.

This philosophy is outlined with a commitment to excellence in liberal and professional education. A profound concern for moral and spiritual values. Maintaining an ecumenical atmosphere open to diversity. Service to the Church, the community, the nation, and the world. And finally an attentiveness to global concerns.

Those statements take time to understand and just scratch the surface when it comes to the emotion behind them.

On the surface these seem like immense expectations, but once students begin their endeavors on the campus of Duquesne University, they soon realize the challenge is not how to meet them but how to describe them.

A sensation so spectacular can be hard to put into words. That’s why graduate student Morgan Lambert wanted to capture it in a photo.

“In Media Lab,” Lambert said, “the class was assigned to take a photo during class that encompasses the mission statement of Duquesne University. I went to the statue of the class ring, I focused the ring in the foreground to show the details of the ring and the school motto, the background you can see the cross and the lines below the statue make you follow it to a student sitting on the nearby bench, I wanted to incorporate element of the location, a student and the cross and motto represents that we serve God by serving others.”

The University. The City. The Crest. The pathway to success. All front and center.

The bricks pave way to a bench. A bench you could be sitting on, dreaming of the future and all the possibilities a ring from Duquesne can provide you.

So much is happening in this photo, and at the same time, so much is yet to happen.

Sometimes, we struggle to find the words we want when describing how we feel. The words become hard to find, even though the sensation is very real. This photo, though, is explaining everything we want to say.