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Variety of Presentations at Community Engagement Symposium
Barry University’s fourth annual Community Engagement Symposium featured a variety of presentations during six sessions. Presentations covered service-learning, community-based research, study abroad, advocacy, and community partnership building.
“Exploring Community-Focused Dimensions of Experiential Learning” was the theme of the symposium held on March 29.
The schedule of sessions included the following topics: “Building Relationships to Support Community-Based Research”; “Addressing Digital Divide Issues in Our Community through a Computer Systems Service-Learning Course”; “When Civic and Cyber Worlds Collide: Service-Learning and Human Rights Advocacy in an Interconnected World”; “Interdisciplinary Collaborative Benefits through a Study-Abroad Experience”; “Stories of Adversity: Utilizing Storytelling for Diversity Training and Youth Empowerment”; and “Community Partner as Co-Educator: Best Practices and Professional Development for Community Partners to Enhance Outcomes.”
The presenters included faculty, staff, and students from Barry University, Florida Atlantic University, Lynn University, Miami Dade College, and Miami Shores-based schools. Some of Barry’s community partners were among the presenters during concurrent sessions and the community partner showcase.
Dr. Patrick M. Green, director of the Center for Experiential Learning at Loyola University Chicago, was the lead presenter at the symposium. He conducted a morning workshop on the topic, “Reflecting on Community Work: A Framework for Meaning-Making,” and a lunch-hour seminar titled “Leading with Community: Emphasizing Community in Community-Based (Experiential) Learning.”
Provost Dr. John Murray and Vice Provost Dr. Christopher “Kit” Starratt delivered remarks during the symposium, as did Michael Norris, director of campus engagement at Florida Campus Compact. Dr. Karen Callaghan, associate vice president for undergraduate studies, spoke during the closing session.
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Three Students Receive Award for Creating Community Impact
Naif Alkhathran, Jasmine McKee, and Paola Montenegro received the 2017 Community Impact Award recently. Dr. Scott Smith, vice president for student affairs, presented a plaque to each winner in recognition of exemplary community engagement primarily through direct service and advocacy.
As a Barry Service Corps Fellow, Alkhathran worked closely with Church World Service, a Barry community partner, to support refugee families from Colombia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq. He even raised money to cover hotel stays for recently arrived Syrian families.
Alkhathran also contributed to a Deliberative Dialogue forum on political discourse in the 2016 election season and helped to organize the Campus Democracy Project’s Debate Watch events. He spent last summer working on Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and shared his experience on social media with followers in the United States and in his native Saudi Arabia. Additionally, he founded Barry’s Saudi Student Club and engaged the club’s 50 members in service projects.
Alkhathran is now working on a project to build solidarity with members of the Jewish community, aimed at fostering a peaceful and inclusive global community.
As a Barry Service Corps member assigned to the Campus Democracy Project, McKee exceeded her voter registration targets. She made educating new voters fun – offering interesting information about the candidates at Campus Debate Watch Parties and using her imitation voting booth to familiarize students with the voting process. On Election Day, she shuttled many of her peers from campus to the polls.
Furthermore, to reach the voters of the future, McKee formed a Speech and Debate Club, which met each week to teach children at the Lillie C. Evans Elementary School the importance of civic engagement.
Montenegro contributed to the development of campus-community partnerships with several local organizations. This year, she helped to launch Barry FairShare, a community-supported agriculture project that benefits Liberty City, one of Miami’s economically disadvantaged neighborhoods.
As a student leader, Montenegro learned community-organizing strategies and then played a key role in promoting farmworkers’ rights. Significantly, she recruited more than 300 students and coordinated their participation in several peaceful demonstrations to support the efforts of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers.
As an Executive Board member of Barry’s Alternative Breaks student organization, she facilitated service trips to communities in Florida, Louisiana, and Texas, as well as to Port-de-Paix, Haiti. In 2016, she was among a select group of student leaders who lobbied lawmakers on Capitol Hill to support programs aimed at ending extreme poverty and preventable diseases, particularly in Africa.
The Center for Community Service Initiatives (CCSI) hosted Barry’s fourth annual Community Engagement Awards on March 29.
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Barry Group Addresses Healthcare, Education Issues in Haiti
A group of Barry students, faculty, and staff members spent spring break in the northwestern region of Haiti addressing healthcare and education issues and developing university-community partnerships.
The 13-member group included Alternative Breaks program participants, students taking a nursing study-abroad course, and faculty representing the College of Nursing and Health Sciences and the School of Education.
Nursing students Milouse “Mimi” Boldwyn and Diana Ospina spent four days in the Port-de-Paix area, before traveling south to serve at a nursing college in Leogane, near Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital.
Dr. Jessie Colin, a Barry professor of nursing, founded the Episcopalian University’s Faculté des Sciences Infirmière (Faculty of Nursing Science) in 2005.
Sharing the experience with the two students were Dr. Mureen Shaw, assistant professor of nursing, and Tatiana Rodríguez, a lab operations coordinator in the College of Nursing and Health Sciences.
Before heading out from that area, the team from Nursing delivered a gift of textbooks, medical supplies, and nursing lab items to staff at the Universite Notre Dame D’Haiti UDERS (United Diocesan Education of Research for Service) de Port-de-Paix.
During Shaw’s 2016 visit to that institution, its administrators identified the acquisition of teaching materials as crucial to the successful training of a generation of nurses so they would be able to provide quality medical care to residents of Haiti’s northwestern region.
Meanwhile, seven students taking part in Alternative Spring Break – Alexis Alexander, Janene Bottinelli, Jessica Darring, Frances DiFabio, Taila Garrett, Althea Hylton, and Samantha Ternelus – joined Dr. Sean Buckreis, assistant professor of curriculum and instruction, and Courtney Berrien, associate director of the Center for Community Service Initiatives (CCSI), on a visit to primary schools in the city of Port-de-Paix and in rural communities of northwestern Haiti. They spent time interacting with pupils and teachers.
They also met with pre-service teachers at a Port-de-Paix teachers college, where Buckreis and Berrien co-facilitated a professional development session that focused on creative uses of technology and visual learning aids for stimulating inquiry and critical thinking in the classroom.
Buckreis presented a donation of solar calculators to the college.
A former K-12 social studies teacher, Berrien led a discussion with pre-service teachers about geographic features and opportunities for students to generate questions about social, economic, and political structures by using maps.
The ASB team visited agricultural development and reforestation program sites to explore opportunities for partnership development and had a meeting with the president of the Café Cocano coffee cooperative, Semilforte St. Hubert.
ASB team members also visited the Atelye Thevenet artisans cooperative in the Jean-Rabel commune, located west of the city of Port-de-Paix. The cooperative, which consists primarily of seamstresses and painters, trains local residents in traditional Haitian folk arts and provides employment to women, allowing families to send their children to school.
Teresita Gonzalez, the mission office director of the Archdiocese of Miami, led the immersion trip to Haiti. A Barry alumna, Gonzalez also is the mission coordinator for Amor En Acción, a lay missionary organization founded by Dr. Alicia Marill, an associate professor of theology.
Through its partnership with Amor en Acción, the university is developing a collaborative relationship with the Diocese of Port-de-Paix, a sister diocese of the Archdiocese of Miami.
Berrien, the CCSI associate director, pointed out that Port-de-Paix is home to Haiti’s “most socio-economically challenged and remote diocese.” She explained that the aim of the visit to the impoverished Caribbean country was to build long-term partnerships that promote development there while also providing Barry students, faculty, and staff with civic learning and service opportunities.
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South Miami Mayor to Participate in Tuesday’s Deliberative Dialogue
City of South Miami Mayor, Dr. Philip Stoddard, will be among the key participants at Tuesday’s deliberative dialogue on the Turkey Point nuclear power plant.
Stoddard, who holds a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Washington, is a professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Florida International University. He has been the mayor of South Miami since 2010.
The CCSI-organized deliberative dialogue titled “Turkey Point Nuclear Power Plant: Endangering the Environment for Cheap Energy?” is an Earth Justice Month event at Barry. The 90-minute forum will be held in Room 112 of the Andreas Building, beginning at 4 p.m.
Also on the list of key participants is Kelly Cox, Esq., the staff attorney and program director at Miami Waterkeeper, a nonprofit organization that “defends, protects, and preserves Biscayne Bay and surrounding waters through citizen involvement and community action.” Cox works extensively on clean-water issues, sea-level rise readiness, and ecosystem protection by implementing environmental laws such as the National Environmental Policy Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Endangered Species Act.
Dr. Timothy DePalma, an assistant professor in the Emergency Management Program of Barry’s School of Professional and Career Education (PACE), and Alberto Liriano, a Barry Service Corps fellow, will be on the panel of lead participants as well.
Dr. Karen Callaghan, dean of Barry’s College of Arts and Sciences, will facilitate the forum. Callaghan is a professor of sociology.
The CCSI has adapted deliberative dialogue as a method of civic learning and engagement. Students, alumni, faculty, staff, and community members work toward a shared understanding of social issues, practical solutions to those issues, and recommendations for workable public policy.
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Saturday of Service, Move-Out Drive on Earth Justice Month Calendar
Barry University’s mission statement includes a commitment to recognizing the sacredness of Earth and to engage in meaningful efforts toward social change. The Earth Justice Month calendar includes a Saturday of Service and the kickoff of the semester’s Move-Out Drive.
A group of students will spend the morning (8:30 a.m.–noon) of Saturday, April 22, providing voluntary service on Urban GreenWorks’ Cerasee Farm in Liberty City. Urban GreenWorks was a recipient of the university’s Community Partnership Award last month.
Additional information on the Saturday of Service is available from Ashton Spangler, CCSI program coordinator, at aspangler@barry.edu or 305-899-5465. The Move-Out Drive kickoff will take place on Friday, April 28. Volunteers will support the project between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m.
For details of the Move-Out Drive, contact Shernee “Shay” Bellamy in the Office of Mission Engagement at sbellamy@barry.edu or 305-899-4582.
Tuesday’s deliberative dialogue on the Turkey Point nuclear power plant is also on the Earth Justice Month calendar. The forum will take place in Andreas 112 from 4:00 to 5:30 p.m.
For further information on that event, contact Courtney Berrien, CCSI associate director, at cberrien@barry.edu or 305-899-4017.
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Faculty Learning Community Meeting Scheduled for April 24
The academic year’s final meeting of the Faculty Learning Community for Engaged Scholarship will be held on April 24. The CCSI will host the meeting from 2:00 to 3:30 p.m. in Adrian 208.
Any faculty member may join the FLC and attend meetings and seminars throughout the academic year. |
Box Tops for Education Drive is Ongoing Campus-wide
The Box Tops for Education Drive organized by the Minority Association of Pre-health Students (MAPS) and the Center for Community Service Initiatives (CCSI) is ongoing.
“Your support over the past three years has been extraordinary, and we thank you,” said Dr. Stephanie Bingham, MAPS advisor. “As a reminder, your Box Tops donations are now alternating between North Miami Elementary and Sheridan Hills Elementary each donation cycle.”
Bingham reminds staff, faculty, and students that participating is very easy. “Simply identify the Box Tops logo on household products you already purchase, including many grocery items, and cut the logo from the packaging. You may submit your Box Tops in the donation boxes on campus.”
Donation boxes are found at various locations, including in the CCSI office, Adrian 208.
“If there is not a donation box in your area, you may request one,” the MAPS advisor said.
Alternatively, Box Tops donations may be sent via interoffice mail to Bingham in the Department of Biology, Siena 309. She can also arrange for donation pickup from individuals on campus.
For further information, BarryMAPS@gmail.com.
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CCSI Newsletter
Posted On : April 11, 2017
