UCC students excel in Undergraduate Awards
UCC has swept the board at the Undergraduate Awards, boasting seventeen “exceptional entries” in the Highly Commended category and three overall winners.
The Undergraduate Awards which was founded in 2008 by two Trinity College graduates, Oisin Hanrahan and Paddy Cosgrave, is an initiative “to celebrate students who propose fresh arguments and new approaches, providing undergraduate students with an opportunity to accelerate their ideas on a global platform.”The Awards are open to final and penultimate year undergraduate students across Europe, North America, Asia and Australia who are invited to submit essays or projects that have received a high 2.1 or above and present fresh ideas and new arguments. The entries are then assessed by international academics as part of UA’s mission to identify and build a community around the world’s brightest students.Jesse Harrington, a recent UCC graduate now studying in the University of Cambridge is an overall winner in the Historical Studies & Archaeology category. His entry entitled "Conveying the Sacred: Expressions of Sacred Space and Sacred Time in the Scheme of Ardmore Cathedral", is an essay which he prepared for a final year course on the history of religious art in the Middle Ages.“My work was a study of the architectural and artistic scheme of the 12th-century Ardmore cathedral and its sculptures, as they would have been understood by the medieval viewer in terms of sacred time and space. I argued that the biblical scenes depicted on the walls of the cathedral were deliberately selected to represent the division of time into four ages – both a literal depiction of history and a metaphor for the triumph of the Church – while also conveying a common theme of judgement as it related to penance, pilgrimage, and salvation.”He explains his reasons for entering: “As a research topic it was something I fell into by accident, not realising when I started how much work remained to be done on the subject, and I ultimately submitted it to the Undergrad Awards on the suggestion of my lecturer Dr. Krasnodebska-D'Aughton, who regarded it highly as a piece of research.”Our very own Arts and Literature Editor Julie Daunt is one of the Highly Commended entries in the Modern Cultural Studies category. Her submission is an essay written for one of her History of Art modules entitled "Behind the Masks of Paul Klee".Julie explains how she focussed on this topic as it was another area that seemed to be under-researched. “He was a Swiss/German painter during the first World War. The reason why I chose to focus on his mask paintings was due to the lack of research and articles written about them. I wrote about three of his "mask" paintings: Mask of Fear, Actor's Mask and Mask with the Little Red Flag. I researched these paintings to try and determine the meaning behind them. In the end I settled on the Mask paintings representing his personal feelings towards the war, but also how people put on a performance and masquerade to cover up their inner troubles.”On winning, Jesse says “Obviously I'm delighted for myself and UCC to be honoured nationally in this way, as a recognition of the support I received from the faculty at the School of History, and especially as a reaffirmation of my continued studies abroad in medieval history as a postgraduate.”Julie is also delighted by her win “I didn't expect to get anywhere with it, so when I got the e-mail saying I was shortlisted and in the top two hundred people, I was really surprised and excited.”Julie and Jesse, along with all other winners and highly commended entrants are invited to attend the UA Summit – a “Davos for students” in Dublin from the 7th to the 10th of November. This summit will include talks, panel discussions, workshops and events geared towards equipping the attendees with “the knowledge they need to further themselves, their ideas and research.”President of Ireland Michael D. Higgins, who has been patron of the Awards since February 2012 will present the 39 UA winners at the 2012 Undergraduate Awards Ceremony to being hosted in the Royal Hospital Kilmainham.