The

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Who was Corinne Schillings?

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Corinne Jeannine Schillings, was a 26 year old woman who lost her life in

the Baltimore Water Taxi Accident on March 6, 2004. Corinne was a Silver Award Girl Scout

and a 1999 graduate of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Corinne received her

undergraduate degree in foreign language, majoring in Italian; she also studied Spanish, French,

and Portuguese. She spent two semesters studying in Italy, first in Florence and then Milan. During

her study abroad in Florence, Corinne met her soon to be fiancé Andrew Roccella, who also

died in the accident. Corinne believed strongly in higher education for women and in learning about

various cultures through language.

Learn more about Corinne by visiting some of her

Favorite Places

(click on the logo to visit the site)

Born July 1, 1977, Corinne grew up in the southern Chicago suburb of Homewood, Illinois.

Beginning in Kindergarten she attended Churchill Elementary School and then moved on to James Hart Junior High School, where she was in band and captain of the Pompon squad. Corinne also worked in the district office during summer vacations from Purdue University.

In 1995, Corinne graduated from Homewood-Flossmoor High School. During high school she was a member of numerous clubs, the school band, a cheerleader, and the Pompon squad.

After high school she attended Purdue University, majoring in Italian and Spanish, and studying Portuguese and French. While at Purdue Corinne was a member of Alpha Gamma Delta, and lived in the sorority house beginning her sophomore year. She received her Bachelor’s Degree in December, 1999.

While attending Purdue Corinne studied in Florence, Italy during the summer of 1998. While in Florence she met Andrew Roccella, also studying through one of Purdue’s programs. (Even though they both attended Purdue, they had to go to Italy to meet.)

As much as Corinne loved Florence, she wanted to live in another Italian city also, so she returned the next year for a semester of study in Milan, where she lived with five Italian roommates (talk about total language emersion).

After graduating from Purdue, in January 2000 Corinne moved to Washington to become an executive assistant at the National Italian American Foundation. Here she was able to utilize many of her skills in the Italian language and culture.

Corinne’s first apartment in the DC area was in Alexandria, on Van Dorn St. Every day she took the Metro to work downtown – catching it at the Pentagon Station, a very scary and tragic place on September 11, 2001.

After a little over one year at NIAF Corinne moved, becoming an assistant at the Cato Institute, a Washington think tank. Soon, she moved into the web department and became Web master of their site, continuously updating and maintaining the home page.

In the summer of 2003, Corinne moved to a new apartment in Arlington, VA, one block from the Iwo Jima memorial and adjacent to Arlington National Cemetery, the location was immediately across the river from the city of Washington.

Always eager to learn, Corinne was accepted into the graduate school at George Mason University to obtain a degree in International Studies, and had just begun pursuing her Master’s degree.

Although transplanted to the Washington area, Corinne was a mid-western girl through and through. She loved the city of Chicago, especially at Christmas, when the family would go downtown to enjoy the season that she loved so much.