Kelly McKindley is a senior English literature major who will argue that Taylor Swift is brilliant, saying, “I have my reasons.” Coming from Monroe, WA, she was intrigued by literature classes in high school and wondered why people study writing, read books, and so forth, which inspired her to study English and try to find the answer. Four years later, she says she is still trying to answer that question. “I really enjoyed the essay class with Dr. Chaney. It was the first class I took in studying a particular writing style and I thought the essays we read were a lot of fun. I think that studying Montaigne really encouraged me to be more free and creative in how I think/what I write about too; he invented a writing style, so it kind of made me think, ‘what the hell, there are no rules.’” During her time at SPU, her most memorable time was when she traveled to Spain and Morocco. Kelly hopes to change “people’s lives with [her] charming sense of humor.” For incoming students she says, “Be kind. Be generous. Meet new people. Try new things. Have fun. Go new places. Go to a different country. Live outside the box [. . .] or, in the words of Ms. Frizzle, ‘Take chances, make mistakes, get messy!’”