Service
Area nonprofits, businesses provide service opportunities for Mount community
Photo by Lee Ferris
The Mount’s Community Impact Fair brought together two dozen nonprofits and businesses, offering a wide array of opportunities to serve the local community.
The fair, spearheaded by the college’s Desmond Center for Community Engagement and Wellness, connected students, faculty, and staff with the local organizations to forge meaningful, service-based partnerships.
“We believe in the power of collaboration,” said Ashley Collazo, acting director of the Desmond Center. “We’re excited by the connections made and the potential for positive impact in our community.”
The Desmond Center provides wellness and educational services for underserved individuals and families, including the uninsured.
Professor honored by Newburgh Urban Farm and Food Initiative
Photos by Lee Ferris
The Newburgh Urban Farm and Food Initiative (NUFFI) recently celebrated Rob Wakeman, associate professor of English and Co-Coordinator of the Knight Summer Connections program, for his unwavering dedication and support.
NUFFI is a not-for-profit organization with a mission to build a just and resilient food system that improves the environment and health of the community in the City of Newburgh.
The event, which took place at Pamela's on the Hudson in Newburgh, also honored a pair of SUNY Orange employees, Likkia Moody and Monty Vacura, for their contributions.
“The leadership that Likkia, Monty, and Rob have demonstrated has helped propel our mission forward, and we are grateful for their ongoing support,” said Virginia Kasinki, executive director of NUFFI. “They have done so much to advance sustainable agriculture and food access initiatives in the Newburgh community.”
Wakeman has incorporated local and cultural food into his Mount classes for several years, building a tangible connection between classroom and real-world experiences. Besides volunteering countless hours on the farm, Wakeman and his students helped develop NUFFI’s 2024 informational planting calendar that the organization sells to support its programming and operations.
“Students today need to be able to make the connection with what they’re learning in the classroom to the issues that are happening in their community,” Wakeman said. “I want to take the liberal arts outside of the classroom and start to put into practice what we’re teaching. We read literature to help understand our place in the world and what other people are going through, to try to build the empathy muscle. But if we don’t ever put that muscle into practice by serving the community, we’re losing something important.”
In addition to his classes, Wakeman has also incorporated student service at the farm into two other Mount programs: Knight Summer Connections, which helps incoming freshmen to transition smoothly from high school to college through team building exercises, classwork, and hands-on volunteer opportunities; and the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE), where students work alongside Mount professors as they explore a research topic of their choosing.
CADP named 100th member of national ITEM Coalition
Photo by Lee Ferris
The Mount’s Center on Aging and DIS-Ability Policy (CADP) was recently named the 100th member organization of the national Independence Through Enhancement of Medicare and Medicaid (ITEM) Coalition.
Social Science professors Lawrence Force and Jeffrey Kahana are co-directors of the CADP. Established in 2006, CADP promotes an interdisciplinary perspective dedicated to excellence in research and scholarship in the fields of gerontology and disability studies. CADP is also a national resource for the Area Agencies on Aging (AAA).
Force is proud that CADP was named a member of the ITEM Coalition: “We are honored to be part of this national group,” he said. “It’s an example of the disability advocacy work our Center on Aging and Dis-Ability Policy is involved in, on a national level.”
Force, a gerontologist, has worked in the field of aging and disabilities for more than three decades as an administrator, clinician, and educator. Kahana is a prolific author on subjects ranging from academics to social issues in the United States.
Comprised of a diverse set of disability organizations, health care associations, aging organizations, and non-profit groups, the ITEM Coalition focuses on improving access to and coverage of assistive devices and technologies for individuals with disabilities of all ages. Among other accomplishments, the ITEM Coalition has helped lead efforts to expand more specific billing codes for intermittent catheters that help reduce urinary tract infections in Medicare beneficiaries with spinal cord injuries, Spina Bifida, and other disabling conditions.
Giving thanks at home and in the community
Photos by Lee Ferris
Mount faculty and staff showed students how thankful the college is for their scholarship and service to the community with a little service of their own by dishing out a delicious Thanksgiving meal at The View dining hall right before the holiday.
Guest servers included Dr. Robert Gervasi, President of the Mount; Fr. Gregoire Fluet, Vice President for Mission and Ministry; and Jen Bready, interim Dean of the School of Arts, Sciences, and Education and professor of Mathematics.
That same week, the Desmond Center for Community Engagement and Wellness served a Thanksgiving meal to families from the Newburgh Enlarged City School District.
The event included good food, a blessing by Fr. Gregoire Fluet, Vice President for Mission and Ministry, and several local organizations on-hand to provide resources and information to families in attendance. Meanwhile, Mount student volunteers helped to keep things running smoothly behind the scenes.
Mount donates hundreds of toys to Catholic Charities
Photo by Lee Ferris
Last Christmas, Santa Claus got a little help from his friends in the Hudson Valley.
The Mount community and generous friends of the college teamed up to make this holiday season a little brighter for families in need, to the tune of more than 700 toys.
The college’s annual toy drive was spearheaded by the Dominican Sisters of Hope Campus Ministry via Fr. Gregoire Fluet, Vice President for Mission and Ministry. Also taking the lead were the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), the Student Government Association, and Mike Lowell, assistant Athletic director and head women’s Lacrosse Coach.
After students and staff loaded them up, the toys collected at the college were donated in-person to Catholic Charities of Orange, Sullivan, and Ulster Counties.
Dominican Scholars donate $700 to Baby Steps pantry
The Dominican Scholars of Hope, under the guidance of Charles Zola, Assistant Vice President for Mission, Director of the Catholic and Dominican Institute, and Associate Professor of Philosophy, present the Baby Steps Baby Pantry at Christ Lutheran Church with a donation of $700.
Photo by Lee Ferris
The Mount’s Dominican Scholars of Hope (DSH) donated $700 to the Baby Steps Baby Pantry (BSBP) at Christ Lutheran Church in Newburgh, N.Y. right before the holidays.
Rooted in the values of the Judeo-Christian and Dominican heritage of the college, DSH is a nonacademic living and learning community for highly motivated Mount students.
Through a Krispy Kreme donut fundraiser, the DSH raised the money for the pantry, which provides infant supplies for families in need in the local area. Each month, families who are part of the program are provided with a week’s worth of diapers, wipes, wash, and cream.
The Rev. Ernst Mossl, pastor of Christ Lutheran Church, was grateful to accept the donations in person, along with board members Erin Ruth and Laura Kohlmann.
The Rev. Mossl thanked Dominican Scholars of Hope advisor Charles Zola, Assistant Vice President for Mission, Director of the Catholic and Dominican Institute, and Associate Professor of Philosophy, for his stewardship of the program.
This is the sixth year the Dominican Scholars have hosted fundraisers to benefit BSBP.
