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2018 LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGES

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President: Tuajuanda C. Jordan, PhD

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Habitat for Humanity: a Favorite Spring Break Activity April 2018 Many students from St. Mary’s College of Maryland use their spring break to put down their laptops and books and pick up a hammer and nails. Coordinated through Habitat for Humanity’s Collegiate Challenge, an alternative spring break volunteer opportunity for high school and college students, SMCM has had student groups head south to Greenville, Ga. for a week each spring to build homes with the Meriweather County Habitat organization. The SMCM chapter of Habitat for Humanity has been participating in this spring break project for 11 years and in that time has built as many homes. Each year the group stays in renovated grain silos on a family pine farm in the area and all their meals are provided by local churches and veteran organizations.

Students work on the roof of the home they built from the ground up.

“When we arrive at the worksite at 8 a.m. on the Monday of break, all that stands on site is the cinderblock foundation and a pile of wood cut to different lengths. We spend the five workdays literally building a house from the foundation all the way through the roof,” said Kate Cumberpatch ’17, who spent the past four years as a student volunteer and this spring as a co-mentor with Scott Mirabile, assoc. prof. of psychology. Cumberpatch said the purpose is to spend a week doing as much as possible to build a house for a citizen of Greenville through Habitat for Humanity, and also to do everything possible as a group to bring the St. Mary’s Way to that small rural Georgia town, ”effectively working to make a positive impact on the community as a whole through relationship-building and a strong commitment to serving their citizens.” This year, 15 of the 17 SMCM community members on the trip were female. Cumberpatch and

A newsletter for the community, faculty, staff and students.

Students stay in renovated silos on a family farm near the work site in Greenville, Ga.

Mirabile said there were some in the area that did not think a group of females could build a house. “We proved those voices wrong, and the students never lost their positive attitudes or respect for others throughout the whole process,” Cumberpatch said. Mirabile said this year’s group of students was inspiring to work with. “They were eager to learn, to work hard, to work as a team, to support each other ... Basically, everything you could want from a group of students: they were it.” Cumberpatch said the amount of work the group gets done in just five days is tremendous and “a testament to what can happen when people work together to achieve a common good.”

Agencies Align on Education for STEM Growth The Naval Surface Warfare Center Indian Head Explosive Ordnance Disposal Technology Division, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, and The Patuxent Partnership formalized an educational partnership agreement that will provide educational and research experiences for SMCM students and faculty using expertise, unique facilities, equipment and technology. Furthermore, the agreement will facilitate student internships, particularly in fields relating to the real-world technical applications required by the U.S. Navy. Representatives from the three organizations signed the educational partnership agreement on Friday, March 23. Left to right: Bonnie Green’74 (executive director of The Patuxent Partnership; Ashley Johnson (NSWC IHEODTD technical director); Scott Kraft (NSWC IHEODTD commanding officer);Tuajuanda C. Jordan (president of SMCM).

The group poses with the homeowner (front center in blue shirt), who helped build the house.

She said what students often get out of the experience is resiliency, how to connect with a community different than their own and adaptability.

Phi Beta Kappa Inducts 19 Students to Zeta Chapter

Mirabile said some benefits are a little harder to explain. “The feeling of accomplishment at the end of the day knowing that we built something that a family will get to call their own, something that will give a child her first bedroom ... that’s indescribable.”

Want More? News, Student and Faculty accomplishments: www.smcm.edu/news Campus Events Calendar: www.smcm.edu/events/calendar 240.895.2000 | www.smcm.edu

Nineteen students were elected to the Zeta Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa on March 30. Phi Beta Kappa is the nation’s oldest academic honor society. For more than 200 years, election to Phi Beta Kappa has signified outstanding achievement in the attainment of an education in the liberal arts and sciences. St. Mary’s College is one of eight institutions in Maryland with a chapter. Sitting, left to right: Rebecca Ritter, Abigail Messaris, Hannah Murphy, Caroline Goyco, Benjamin Ertman, Ziyue Dong, Sydney Cunniff, Allison Barrett. Standing, left to right: Anna Vagnoni, Marilyn Steyert, Caitlin Schoen, Samuel Rosenblatt, Charlotte Torrence, Halcyon Ruskin, Megan Root, Brendan Rollins, Caroline Robertson, Sally McFadden. (missing from photo: Alexander Hafey)


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