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Barry Contributes to Victory in Affordable Housing Policy
Following two years of pressure from PACT (People Acting for Community Together), the Miami-Dade County Commission recently passed a resolution to fund the Affordable Housing Trust Fund to the tune of at least $10 million a year.
Barry students, faculty, and staff contributed to the efforts by participating in PACT assemblies and community meetings and by providing program support through the Barry Service Corps (BSC).
In the fall of 2014, PACT selected homelessness as a new focus issue. After research teams identified a lack of affordable housing as a key factor that leads to homelessness, PACT leaders worked with public officials to establish the Affordable Housing Trust Fund.
Commissioners Daniella Levine Cava and Xavier Suarez, the primary cosponsors of the resolution that established the trust fund, crafted the legislation in response to PACT’s request. Commissioners Barbara Jordan and Jean Monestime, cosponsors of the legislation, also met with PACT representatives, who encouraged their support of the legislation.
PACT is a coalition of 39 Miami-Dade churches, synagogues, mosques, and universities. Its members work cooperatively to identify pressing community issues and follow a direct-action community-organizing strategy to effect social change.
“The strategy begins with a consensus process in which members select two or three issues of focus each year,” explained Courtney Berrien, associate director of the Center for Community Service Initiatives (CCSI). “Research teams then investigate best practices and public policies that can be implemented locally. After reaching consensus, the coalition’s members work directly with politicians and public servants to gain their support for enacting the identified policies. In the final step of the process, PACT members hold the officials accountable by asking them in front of more than 1,000 voters at the annual PACT Nehemiah Action Assembly to follow through with their commitments.”
Throughout this process, Barry students, faculty, and staff supported PACT’s efforts by taking part in the annual meeting, north rally, Nehemiah action, and justice-team ministry assemblies. The Barry participants included theology and sociology students taking service-learning courses, social work graduate students, and BSC fellows.
BSC Fellows Taleah Becton, Mickaelle Celigny, Christopher Riker, and Kevin Dalia worked directly with PACT as a weekly assignment throughout the 2015–2016 academic year. They facilitated community engagement opportunities for students enrolled in service-learning courses, contributed to research on public officials, completed data-entry projects, translated assembly documents, and provided event support.
Becton, Dalia, and Riker, together with CCSI Program Coordinator Andres Quevedo, took part in the North Justice Ministry Team Assembly at St. Philip Neri Catholic Church in Opa-Locka in April. At that meeting, justice ministry leaders provided updates on progress made by PACT’s Affordable Housing Committee as well as the Juvenile Justice Committee.
Through the Juvenile Justice Ministry, PACT has worked with the State Attorney’s office and Miami-Dade County Public Schools to enact policies that provide nonviolent, juvenile offenders with alternatives to incarceration, such as in-school suspension and peer-mediation programs for restorative justice.
Dalia, who has been serving with PACT for two years through the BSC Fellows Program, said he appreciated the opportunities for learning and leadership development.
“This leadership opportunity has allowed me to understand how community organizing works,” Dalia said. “You have to appeal to a person’s self-interest without making them feel selfish, and, in a way, that will hold them accountable and invested.”
Celigny and Becton supported PACT by completing infrastructure projects. One of the projects was a member database, which Celigny, a computer science major, developed for the organization. The database facilitates PACT’s record-keeping and communication with participating congregants.
Becton, with support from Brandon Parker, a BSC member and film major, produced two short films about PACT’s work. They completed the first film in March and used it to recruit congregants for the Nehemiah Action Assembly.
For the second film, Becton interviewed PACT board members about the organization’s nearly 20 years of work to support social-justice initiatives in Miami-Dade County. The film will be posted on the organization’s website. Dr. Adam Dean, an associate professor of communication, provided technical support to the film project.
Since the organization’s founding in 1998, PACT has achieved victories in the areas of education, employment, youth violence, economic development, and crime prevention. According to the organization’s website, PACT is the largest grassroots organization in South Florida.
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Two Students Awarded St. Catherine Medal for Outstanding Service
Two students have been awarded the 2016 St. Catherine Medal for outstanding leadership and service. They are graduating senior Peter Nwokoye and sophomore Paola Montenegro.
Barry’s president, Sister Linda Bevilacqua, OP, PhD, conferred the honor on both students at the Honors Convocation on May 6. Sister Sara Fairbanks, OP, PhD, an associate professor of theology, summarized the students’ achievements.
Sister Sara noted that Nwokoye has served as president of the Chemistry Honor Society and was actively involved in the project known as COACH (Chemistry Outreach: Approaching Chemistry Hands On), which serves local under-resourced elementary and high schools. He also participated in the 2015 Alternative Spring Break trip to Immokalee
“Peter puts his scholastic gifts at the service of others in countless ways,” Sister Sara said.
Sister Sara described Montenegro’s record of service as “impressive.”
Montenegro has worked closely with the Center for Community Service Initiatives as a Barry Service Corps Fellow and an Alternative Breaks leader, helping to organize service trips to Immokalee and Port-de-Paix
Each year, Kappa Gamma Pi Honor Society makes the St. Catherine Medal available for outstanding student leadership and service to the university and the wider community. The Honors Committee uses a nomination and selection process to award the medal.
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Theology Students Provide 2,466 Hours of Service to the Community
Theology students recently provided 2,466 hours of service to the community as they completed the service-learning requirements of three courses. The service provided by the 274 students during the spring semester benefited 94 community-based organizations and projects.
The students were enrolled in 14 service-learning sections of three theology courses. The courses were THE 201: Theology – Faiths, Beliefs, and Traditions (11 sections); THE 306: Dynamics of Faith, Beliefs, and Theology (one section); and THE 311: Sexuality, Sex, and Morality (two sections).
The Faiths, Beliefs, and Traditions course instructors were Sister Mary Frances Fleischaker, Dr. Deena Grant, Dr. Christopher Jones, Dr. Marc Lavallee, Fr. José David Padilla, Fr. Jorge Presmanes, Dr. James Nickoloff, Dr. Gloria Schaab, and Fr. Mark Wedig. Dr. Alicia Marill taught THE 306 and Dr. Christopher Jones was the instructor for THE 311.
Service sites included local nature preserves, food-distribution venues, community centers, nursing homes, and targeted advocacy locales in Miami-Dade County. The community partners and projects included Amnesty International, Carnival Arts, the College Brides Walk, EcoTech Visions, Feeding South Florida, Gang Alternative, Missionaries of Charity of Mother Teresa, Mount
Projects addressed such issues as police-citizen relations, dating and domestic violence, farm-workers’ rights, youth mentorship, long-term care, and food insecurity.
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Students Learn and Practice Story-Telling for Social Change
Nine Barry students participated in a recent diversity-training session aimed at promoting social change.
MCCJ (formerly the Miami Coalition of Christians and Jews) conducted the eight-hour training session as part of a community engagement project designed by Barry Service Corps (BSC) Fellows Seretse Davis and Rajon Wright.
Wright explained that the goal of the training was to prepare college students to connect with youth around common experiences, and through that connection, to demonstrate that violence is not a solution to social problems.
MCCJ Program Director Lutze Segu was the training facilitator. A Barry alumna, she guided the students through a story-telling process, which included identifying their own experiences with prejudice and discrimination and preparing stories about those experiences to be shared with a middle- and high-school audience.
Several of the Barry students who participated in the training presented their stories as part of an interactive panel at Gang Alternative’s BLOC (Building Leaders of Character) program. BLOC utilizes an evidence-based approach to teach adolescents moral reasoning, anger control, and social problem-solving skills, explained Ezra Dieuveille,Gang Alternative’s senior youth prevention specialist.
Davis and Wright facilitated weekly service trips to the BLOC program site this academic year as part of their role on the BSC Fellows Program’s youth development team.
The other students who participated in the diversity-training session were Taleah Becton, Jacob Ceasar, King Guerrero, Ajahni Johnston, Alberto Liriano, Trevor Singleton, and Asha Starks. They are expected to facilitate story-telling panels in schools and youth-serving community organizations during the 2016–2017 academic year.
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Newsletter to be Published Twice in June and July
TheCenter for Community Service Initiatives (CCSI) recently announced a change in the publication schedule of its newsletter for the summer. Engagement News will be published twice in June and July, with the next issue scheduled to be out on June 20.
One issue of the newsletter will be published in August before the start of the new academic year, and regular weekly issues will return on August 22.
Engagement News is published by the Department of Marketing of Communications on behalf of the CCSI.
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CCSI Newsletter
Posted On : June 06, 2016
