The McAllaster Honors Program 30th Anniversary Reunion
Published: December 13, 2025
Author: Lydia Cahill
Photo by Dave Bell
On the blustery Saturday morning of Homecoming, Greenville University hosted an event 30 years in the making: the first reunion of the McAllaster Honors Program.
Unveiling Our Roots: Creating a Detailed History of the Program
Before alumni arrived on campus, Professor Fields discussed how he became the Honors Director and his hopes for how the event would impact current students and alumni.
“I came here in 2022 to teach history and philosophy, and I was asked to direct the program even though that was not my original intention. However, it has been a really big blessing for my time at Greenville.”
Some key dates surrounding the program’s earliest years are still being pieced together. However, every fall during the induction of new honors students, the sign-in book is still utilized. The journal contains the signatures of every first-year honors student since the program’s start. This book inspired Fields to begin uncovering the program’s earliest history.
“I am a historian by trade, and last year I was looking at the book that freshmen sign during their induction. We always had 1996 as the program's start date on the paperwork given to me, but I noticed in the book that some students had signed as early as 1995. It clicked in my head that we are coming up on a bigger anniversary.”
Fields continued, “I thought this event would be a great way to kickstart that larger project of drawing alumni of the program back and building networks between them and our current students; it goes a long way toward building some stability and continuity in the program."
Fields also wanted to use the reunion to shift how people look at the program. To push students even further, they must take ownership of their academic careers, including taking on roles within the program.
“I would really like to use collective language about our program and our vision. That is one of the things I try to talk to the students about; it is really their program, since it is for them. The program exists for their edification, and I hope for the broader community, to the extent that they want to partner with the program, that it really is all for the students.”
Photo by Dave Bell
Recent Graduates Reflect on the Memories and Lessons They Gained from the Program
Three young alumni who just finished their degrees in May, Kennedy Gerton, Olivia McConnaughay, and Lucas Nowlan, also attended and provided a wealth of memories.
Gerton remarked that Fields cultivated close relationships with his students by having open office hours and engaging in meaningful conversations.
Gerton said, “Dr. Fields is great about having open office hours, and I loved it. We would talk about the thesis, or his kids, or any number of things.”
Though the honors thesis may only seem like extra stress and anxiety, it taught McConnaughay this,
“You can freak out, but freak out productively. Get it out on paper, brainstorm, talk to people, get advice, and center around something that you are passionate about. Don’t give up on it even though it is hard and lean on your friends.”
The thesis greatly impacted the alumni not only as students but as people.
Photo by Wyatt Boyer
Gerton said of her thesis process, “A big lesson I learned from the program is that it is very confidence-inspiring to finish a project as big as the thesis. Even with the support of the professors, you are mostly doing all that research yourself, so when it is finally done you can look at it and say, ‘I did this.’ It just filled me with confidence that I can go out into the workplace, and I am qualified to do it.”
Nowlan continues to apply skills he learned from his thesis in his current workplace, “My thesis required a lot of writing, but it definitely made me a better writer and allowed me the room I needed to grow. Those skills helped just this past week when I applied to the state of Illinois for a grant to fund cemetery cleanup. A large part of that described the cemetery's needs. I was able to use a lot of the writing skills I had gained from the program, and that helped me to write it.”
Nowlan also presented advice to current honors students as they work through their thesis process: "Get your thesis done as soon as you can. It's going to be a long, tedious process, but it will be a good one, especially if you are going into grad school. It may seem like a lot, you might even start falling behind, but it is ultimately going to be a rewarding process because you can work through a length of research plus writing. It is going to be incredibly valuable moving forward.”
Although McConnaughay, Gerton, and Nowlan only graduated in May, they recognize that people have poured into them, and they hope to replicate this impact in the lives of current students.
Gerton said of the program, “I think it is great to have a community of people like the honors program that are so dedicated to the intense passion for learning. I think that it is awesome that we can have older people support the younger people going forward.”
Into Tomorrow
While it is in the classroom that much of the program's value is formed, this reunion showed that the skills learned through the program are applicable in the larger world. Meeting with alumni has served as a reminder that, over the past 30 years, the honors program has not only built a reputation for academic rigor but has also formed intentional, faithful people.
Photo by Wyatt Boyer
