Hanna Caiola, a rising junior softball player at Muhlenberg, went back in time over the summer.

Working with Dr. Daniel Leisawitz of the Italian program, Caiola studied the Orlando Furioso, an epic poem written in 1516 by Ludovico Ariosto.

"What we wanted to do was map out the journeys of the different characters throughout the epic," said Caiola. "So we took the different places that the characters traveled to and mapped them onto a map of the world as it was thought of in the 1500s. And then by doing that we could use that in one way as a teaching tool for students who are going to study the Orlando Furioso, and also it would be interesting just to see what types of patterns arise from the different journeys as they intersect and intertwine on the map."

Caiola, who earned All-Centennial Conference honors in 2016, is a neuroscience major. "It really doesn't have anything to do with neuroscience, but I've always liked coding and I've always been really interested in Italian and Italian culture," she said. "Working one on one with a professor and really getting to know what I'm doing more and also adding that computer aspect to it, I really like that because it's kind of just bringing everything together."

The opportunity for interdisciplinary study while continuing her softball career was one of the factors that brought Caiola to Muhlenberg.

"When I first started my college search, I started looking at Division I schools," she said. "As I got older I started to realize if I did end up going D-1 ... there would be a lot of opportunities I would miss out on because it's so time consuming.

"Being at Muhlenberg where its D-3 but also a liberal arts college ... there's also so many different disciplines that I could get into with research or with other projects with faculty."

Caiola will explore Italian culture further when she studies abroad in Siena, Italy, during the fall semester.

"I think that it's awesome that I have the opportunity to study all the different things that I love," she said.