Frank Tisellano Wins “Voyage of
Discovery”
After totally overwhelming the competition, Frank Tisellano ’10C
has been selected to act as social media leader during the National Italian-American
Foundation’s 2010 Ambassador
Peter F. Secchia Voyage of Discovery to Italy this month.
The St. John’s University senior, who just complete his B.A.
degree in English
and
Italian, was recommended to the Foundation’s search committee
by Associate Professor of Italian Fiorentina Russo, Ph.D., who says
that this “meritorious student” was selected over 54 other
candidates across the U.S.
A member of the
Italian Honor Society as well as the University’s Honors Program,
Frank is quite familiar with Italy. As a sophomore, he participated
in St. John’s acclaimed
Rome semester program. The second-generation Italian-American
says the experience was remarkable. “Living among Italians in an
apartment building, studying with Italian professors, buying food
from Italian grocers, even suffering through delays at the Italian
post office, I was totally immersed in the culture.”
This year’s “Voyage of Discovery,” which is intended to
strengthen Italian-American students’ understanding of their
heritage as well as Italy’s numerous contributions to technology,
will take Frank and dozens of other students to Umbria and
Campania, including Vallo Di Diano. He says he expects to be quite
busy over the 10-day trip.
The new St. John’s alumnus will begin setting up the social
media vehicles and composing messaging a few days before the trip
in late May. At each location, he will continue tomake daily
posts. According to Dr. Russo, these “may include pictures,
descriptions of the day’s events, student quotes and
interviews.”
Frank is more specific. “I’ll be on Facebook and Twitter™, in
fact, we’ve discussed holding a raffle there.” He encourages anyone
interested to follow him on those sites and to watch NIAF’s website
for information on accessing his blog and flickr® uploads (“My plan
is to post 100 photos a day!”)