OT T E R B E I N’S SMALL P I ECE S OF A R MOR BUILDING PPE TO PROTECT OUR COMMUNITY BY
GINA M. CALCAMUGGIO PHOTOS BY
ED SYGUDA
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Students and University leaders working to help the greater community is nothing new to Otterbein. When a small team of students rallied together with The Point staff to build personal protective equipment (PPE) in preparation for an anticipated central Ohio outbreak of COVID-19, no one was surprised. According to Erin Bender, executive director of The Point, “it’s just the Otterbein way.” “When we found out there was a need in the community, the first thing that the students and our lab manager asked was, ‘How can we help?’” Bender said that even as the University was shifting to working from home, the team realized that the tools and equipment at The Point’s Maker Space could be valuable in
OTTERBEIN TOWERS SPRING/SUMMER 2020
helping. “As the situation continued to unveil itself, we were looking on blogs, we were looking to some of our corporate partners, we were looking to our healthcare institutions — and we were talking to them on a regular basis to learn what they needed and how we could help them.” Bender said that the collaborative approach informed better decisions and a better strategy. “Rather than just making this or that, we went to our partners and said, for example, ‘OhioHealth — how can we best support you? Here are the tools and things we have.’” The community partners responded with their needs and asked if Otterbein could help. So Otterbein got to work.
