Originally published in Carroll Capital, the print publication of the Carroll School of Management at Boston College. Read the full issue here.
On any given week during his senior year, Aidan Said ’24 could be found juggling classes and homework for his two management concentrations plus the theology major he tacked on junior year, carrying out his duties as part of the Air Force Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, hanging out with friends, and somewhere in there also trying to get some sleep.
Said didn’t mind what he refers to as the “go, go, go” pace of his days, but his evening routine of meditation, prayer, and reflection was a nonnegotiable in his to-do list. “That’s the way I digest my day,” he says, explaining that the process of reflection often helped him make sense of his place in the world amid competing priorities. “When you have all these different ideas that kind of clash, it always leaves you reverberating.”
Aiden Said '24
For many, college is a time of great personal growth—students across the globe experience these moments of clashing ideas—but it is the ability to feel that reverberation, the point where experiences intersect meaningfully, that is integral to a Boston College education. If these years are so formative to students, how exactly is Boston College shaping the college experience? The answer revolves around a concept known as student formation, or “formative education.”
“We don’t own the market around formative education. We’re not the only place that students grow and develop and learn,” says Mike Sacco, executive director of the Center for Student Formation and the Office of First Year Experience. “We’re just a bit more intentional. We have an emphasis on it.”
The broader concept of formation comes from St. Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuit order, and his way of using his own intellect and reasoning to reflect on his personal experiences. Ignatius saw God as a teacher and himself as a student of the world formed in God’s image—he also envisioned the Jesuits as a religious order dedicated to service and teaching.
Even with its faith-based origins, formative education has become part of the Boston College DNA that touches all spheres of life and learning, religious or secular. “All are welcomed and the University is not a church,” says John T. Butler, SJ, the Haub Vice President of the Division of Mission and Ministry. “Yet, the [Jesuit Catholic] ethos springs from the notion that life is a gift and it’s meant to be lived.”
With so many fields of study, service opportunities, clubs, teams, and events to pick from, Boston College emphasizes a choose-your-own-adventure approach to finding meaning during these formative years. The three primary facets of student formation are intellectual, spiritual, and social growth, but these dimensions can, and almost certainly will, interweave as students explore their options.
Andrew Namkoong '24
Andrew Namkoong ’24 appreciates that the University’s core curriculum allowed him to traverse subject areas from epistemology to business law. “Through the core, you become not just specialized but a well-rounded individual,” he says. He shares a similar sentiment about Portico, the required first-year management course that weaves in threads of ethics, philosophy, and social responsibility. That class is part of the reason he later decided to pursue a philosophy major in addition to his finance concentration. “I didn’t know that philosophy could cross over into the business world,” he explains. Around 50 percent of Carroll School students complete an additional major or minor in the arts and sciences. It’s an opportunity to discover surprising connections. For Namkoong, who describes himself as “a big yapper,” the appeal of discussion-based classes like Portico stretched beyond the course material. There he was encouraged, and even expected, to engage vocally with his new peers.
Said chose to blend his intellectual and spiritual growth when he added a theology major to his concentrations: finance, and accounting for finance and consulting. “A lot of what you’re doing in theology is the same as what you do in business—you’re trying to find a precedent,” he says. “If I want to know something about a company, I will look back at their old financial statements. If I want to know something about the Book of Exodus, I’m going to look at the comments from theologians about Exodus.”
“Through the core, you become, not just specialized, but a well-rounded individual.”
It was through his theology classes that Said came to better understand his own spirituality. After attending a Jesuit highschool in Detroit, he was no stranger to Jesuit practices like the Examen, a daily reflection on one’s experiences, but classes including “Buddhism and Christianity in Dialogue” helped Said rethink prayer and reflection through mindfulness. “I view the world through my practice. I do my meditation and my examination of conscience and then pray,” he says. For Said, this routine applies as much to rehashing his performance on an exam as it will to his post-graduation role as an Air Force Tactical Air Control Party Officer. “I’ve had time to think about what this means for me,” he says about his next steps. “It’s daunting but I feel prepared.”
While some students find that their formation is intertwined with their religion, others with no religious affiliation still seek something that helps form them as whole persons. “Although not everyone belongs to a faith tradition, most, whether they know it or not, function in some sort of religious structure, ritual, or symbolic expression,” says Butler. “All of our students want to transcend themselves and experience things greater than who they are and where they came from.”
By virtue of being a Jesuit university, Boston College’s educational and spiritual influences loom large in the formative education picture, but the process would be incomplete without social elements. “We’re trying to inform and educate in the classroom, first and foremost,” says Sacco. “But we also give students experiences to help them grow socially with leadership, self-awareness, and social responsibility.”
Irfane Soumaou '25
Irfane Soumanou ’25, who studies finance as well as computer science, got involved with Boston College’s African diaspora dance group, Presenting Africa to U (PATU), as a way to meet more people on campus. “It was my stress reliever. In the studio, dancing was all I thought about. I wasn’t worried about my other preoccupations. I was having fun doing something I love with my chosen family,” she says, adding that she grew as a dancer and as a team player through PATU.
Namkoong cemented his commitment to social responsibility during his internship with Metro Housing Boston. As part of the Joseph E. Corcoran Center for Real Estate and Urban Action summer internship program, he spent 10 weeks working with the nonprofit, which helps greater Boston residents achieve housing security. “I remember talking with the CEO about not being too idealistic,” Namkoong says. “I’m not going to solve the affordable housing crisis in Boston. It’s a process. If I help a family get a home, that’s a great step.” In his internship with real estate company Greystar the following summer, he was no longer working in low-income housing, but he held onto that lesson. “You want to create shareholder value, but I also want to create value for everyone involved,” he says, adding that he hopes to bring that mindset to his continued work with Greystar as an investment and development analyst.
Sacco highlights that one of the biggest themes of formative education is to have students “understand themselves at a deeper, more honest level.” In doing so, students must pay close attention to how they feel. It can be a vulnerable journey to make alone, but the University’s rich culture of retreats and group discernment makes it easier for students to heed what Sacco refers to as “the call to take care of each other,” by sharing space and personal stories with their peers.
Soumanou, who is Muslim, has participated in both the Black Women Matter and 48 hours retreats. She explains that the experiences allowed her to be more open about her college journey so far. “We’re thinking about moving forward all the time, but it’s really important to acknowledge how far you’ve come,” she says. When she spots students from her retreats on campus, she makes a point of greeting them. “I’m proud of how far they’ve come, too,” she adds.
“We're thinking about moving forward all the time, but it's really important to acknowledge how far you've come. ”
Formative education is, at its heart, a group project. “All who work and participate within a university community are educators, and thus participate in the formative process,” says Butler. While it’s important that professors and academic advisors cultivate meaningful dialogue and big-picture thinking with students, the beauty of wisdom is that it sometimes comes from unlikely sources—Said mentions his roommates, Soumanou talks about her dance teammates, and Namkoong even name-drops Boston College dining hall staff as making a mark on their college experiences.
The University may provide the framework for these opportunities, but ultimately it’s up to the students themselves to embrace their formative education and carve a path forward. “My parents instilled in me this mindset of treating every opportunity as something positive—treating it as a yes,” Namkoong says. “Without that mindset, I wouldn’t have discovered philosophy as a major, I wouldn’t have interned in affordable housing.... I wouldn’t have had all these experiences that have made me who I am today.”
