Special Faculty
Edition!
PROJECT
SPOTLIGHTS
PAGE 6
FACULTY VOICES
PAGE 2
AWARDS AND
GRANTS
PAGE 8
COMMUNITY
PARTNERS
PAGE 10
The Service-Learner
The Voice of Students, Faculty and Community
Volume VI, Issue I
Spring 2015
Office of Academic Service-Learning Spring 2015 Update
Welcome to this special “faculty edition” of The Service-Learner. We thank faculty for the great response to our request
for articles, and we invite you to read about their projects and enthusiasm for the service-learning pedagogy.
Recapping 2014, three new service-learning faculty—Agnieska Tuszynska, Sharon Lall-Ramnarine and Patricia Kinneary
—as well as three new community partners—Zone 126, Community Voices Middle School 356 and Business Technology
Early College High School (BTECH)—provided opportunities for students to apply their classroom learning to community
needs. We are very happy to welcome them to service-learning, and we look forward to sustained relationships with all.
Finally, participation in our research remains strong. Twenty-six faculty participated in the OASL IRB-approved postproject survey, Research and Assessment of Academic Service-Learning at QCC, which includes questions on the impact
of service-learning on workplace readiness skills, civic engagement and academic gain; 15 faculty participated in a threeyear grant funded by the Teagle Foundation to help students build commitment to civic and moral responsibility for
diverse, equitable, healthy and sustainable communities. If you are interested in joining these efforts, please contact us.
Notable Fall 2014 Events
• New CUNY Chancellor James B. Milliken met
on August 5 with a number of QCC students,
including service-learning participants.
• Dr. Robert Franco, Professor of Pacific
Anthropology and Director of the Office for
Institutional Effectiveness at Kapi’olani
Community College, Honolulu, Hawaii, and
Principal Investigator of the Teagle Foundation
Grant, “Student Learning for Civic Capacity:
Stimulating Moral, Ethical, and Civic Engagement
for Learning that Lasts,” visited QCC on
September 16 and presented to over 70 QCC
faculty, staff and students on High Impact
Teaching and Learning: Stimulating Moral, Ethical,
and Civic Engagement for Learning.
• College President Dr. Diane B. Call held a
“Pizza with the President” lunch with 12 servicelearning students on October 29. The students
enthusiastically recalled their service-learning
experiences to Dr. Call.
National Publicity for QCC Service-Learning
Research on the effectiveness of servicelearning for QCC Career and Technical
Education students, funded by a Carl D.
Perkins Grant from the New York State
Education Department, has been
published as a chapter in the book,
Service-Learning at the American
Community College, edited by our
colleagues Dr. Amy Traver and Dr. Zivah
Perel-Katz.
The research, based on results of the
OASL student survey and reflections, and
on student retention rates, assesses the
impact of academic service-learning on
career development. The chapter, “Service-Learning as a
Pedagogical Tool for Career Development and Vocational Training,”
also discusses the numerous observed benefits of an education
that is based in real-life, community settings where academic
learning is transformed into practical, vocational knowledge. The
OASL is privileged to have been asked to contribute to this book,
which includes chapters authored by leading national servicelearning scholars.
PAGE 2
Service-Learning
Projects with Catholic
Charities Brooklyn and
Queens
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
Faculty Voices
Service-Learning: A Win-Win
BY PROF. PATRICIA KINNEARY, NURSING DEPARTMENT
As I reflect on this past semester [Fall 2014], I realize how eventful it was
and how quickly it went. It certainly had its challenges, but also its
highlights. I taught second semester nursing students, and I think they
would agree that the best and most memorable part of the semester was
our experience with service learning. We had the opportunity to visit
Bayside Senior Center of Catholic Charities Brooklyn and Queens to
provide the members with some good health information and home safety
tips. With our theme of health promotion and disease prevention, our goal
was to help the seniors stay well and well-informed.
Nursing students presenting health
info, Prof. Patricia Kinneary
Art therapy students lead workshops
in creative expression, Prof. Susan
Gonzalez
Nursing students and senior citizens
play a game with health facts, Prof.
Janice Molloy
Catholic Charities Brooklyn
and Queens sponsors over
160 programs and services
for children and youth,
adults and seniors, people
with developmental
disabilities, those who are
mentally ill and the isolated.
The students were eager and excited to put their presentations together
and they did an outstanding job. They worked together in teams with each
having their own healthcare topic. They designed poster boards with
accurate information that provided the seniors with important facts and
useful tips on how to stay healthy and free from infection. They
emphasized the importance of proper hand hygiene, safe food handling,
adequate hydration, and getting vaccinated to help fight infection. They
offered important suggestions and home safety tips to help the seniors
prevent falls. They also provided information on how to plan healthy,
nutritious meals with an emphasis on nutrition for targeted diseases. And
they shared some easy tips on staying active and mobile. They also
presented the seniors with apples, bottled water, and individual hand
sanitizers. As you can imagine, it was a big hit. (CONTINUED ON P. 4)
Searching for Wisdom in a Developmental
Psychology Class
BY PROF. EVA GOLDHAMMER, SOCIAL SCIENCES DEPARTMENT
One of the challenges in a Developmental Psychology course taught at
community college is that the three-credit course incorporates childhood,
adolescence, and adulthood. In comparison, at senior colleges, the same
amount of material is divided up into one three-credit course dealing with
child development, and another devoted to adolescence and adult
development. This presents a challenge, as we have to teach more
material in less time, to our students. Our student population does not do
well if we send them home just to read more material on their own, so
creative strategies are called for. Last semester, I opted to introduce a
service-learning project in one of my Developmental Psychology classes.
Students went to one of several senior centers run by Catholic Charities
Brooklyn and Queens. In this way, I could concentrate on child and
adolescent development and rely on students gaining concrete
knowledge about the adult phases of development.
The purpose of the project was to have a more concrete way of
understanding people who are in a later developmental phase of life.
Students played an interactive board game with senior citizens, called
Age-Tastic, which was developed by the New York City Department for
the Aging. It served the purpose of being a social emollient, which helped
younger and older participants come to understand each other better, and
to open up more comfortable communication. (CONTINUED ON P. 4)
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
PAGE 3
Faculty Voices
Service-Learning’s Hands-On Link
Toward the Workforce
“A Moment without Cell Phones”:
EN-101 and CLIP Interview Project
BY PROF. EDWARD DAVIS, ENGINEERING
TECHNOLOGY DEPARTMENT
BY PROF. BETH COUNIHAN, ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
Within MT-219, Surveying and Layouts students
encounter “hands-on” experience using surveying
instruments typical for the field—whether measuring
distances, elevations, or angles—within a given
coursework environment. This is gained knowledge
obtained through practical application. Servicelearning provides a “missing link,” tying students’
newfound knowledge to a real-world application and
eventual use in the workforce.
Two service-learning projects given within Surveying
and Layouts are distance measurements along the
Udalls Cove Park walking trails and elevation
differences for calorie count along the proposed Tiger
Trails fitness paths at QCC. Mary Prentice and Gail
Robinson in their 2010 report, “Improving Service
Learning Outcomes within Student Learning,” cite six
measurable areas, of which three apply for Surveying
and Layouts: Communication, academic development
and educational success, and career and teamwork.
There is always keen interest among students upon
mentioning new work apart from the routine. At Udalls
Cove Park, students encounter unmeasured trails,
(CONTINUED ON P. 5)
Caught up in the busyness of life, it seems like people
rarely get to just sit and talk. And yet, we know that
communication skills are very important—for one’s social
and personal life, education and career. In EN-101, we
focus on academic writing skills above all, but looking
around the classroom, I see how students, with their
heads bent down absorbed in their smartphones, need to
make more direct connections with each other. For about
eight semesters now, I have been working with Lauren
Most in the CUNY Language Immersion Program (CLIP)
on a service-learning project with the same goal for both
classes: Engagement. In Fall 2014, my EN-101 class, all
students in the ASAP program, worked with Lauren
Most’s first year CLIP students. Lauren’s students are
non-matriculated students learning English; my students,
many of whom speak another language at home, are
recent high school graduates, new to college.
The first meeting was to do oral history interviews of the
CLIP students. After reading samples of oral history, my
students asked the CLIP students about their families,
lives, and immigration stories. (CONTINUED ON P. 5)
Service-Learning in EE-103
BY PROF. JEFFREY L. SCHWARTZ, ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY DEPARTMENT
EE-103, Computer-Aided Analysis for
applied to EE-103 in Fall 2014.
Electrical Engineers, is an earlyPrincipal Tu indicated that she is
semester course in which students
always looking for opportunities for
majoring in engineering science learn
her students to experience the
how to solve problems using
college environment, and she is
MATLAB, a mathematical
interested in developing her
programming language and
students’ presentation skills. We
environment with one million users in
realized that having my college
industry and academia. Spring 2014
students give presentations to her
was my first semester teaching this
high school students would work
course, and I chose to include an oral
well. The high school students would
presentation to meet the general
learn what the college students were
The 0s and 1s of presentations
education objective of
studying and observe their
communicating effectively through
presentation skills, while my college
speaking. I found that my engineering science
students would have the opportunity to present to an
students all had very good presentation skills, and I
audience with a less technical background than their
wondered if there were a way to develop them even
classmates and professor. As I have heard at
further.
conferences and experienced personally, while
presentation skills may not top the list of what one thinks
At the end of that semester I met with Mary
of when one thinks of engineering, these skills are vitally
Bandziukas from OASL and Hoa Tu, Principal of the
important to engineers who must make others understand
newly-opened Business Technology Early College High
how his or her work fits in with larger engineering projects
School (BTECH) to see how service-learning could be
(CONTINUED ON P. 4)
PAGE 4
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
Faculty Voices, Continued
Win-Win
Searching for Wisdom
(CONTINUED FROM P. 2) These
are just some of the many topics
that our nursing students study
during their second semester, and
they are also some of the most
important topics about which we
can teach our senior citizens. We
commonly see many of our
elderly, hospitalized patients
admitted with various types of
infections, fluid imbalances,
dehydration, and injuries from
falls. As we age, so too does our
immune system, and we naturally
become more susceptible to these
and other disease states.
Providing the seniors with some
basic information and health
safety tips can potentially protect
them from a future hospitalization.
(CONTINUED FROM P. 2) Students
also came prepared with questions
that they could inject into these
conversations, such as: ‘What was
the best/worst day of your life?’;
‘What is your greatest regret?’;
‘What advice would you give to
someone who is starting life now?’
Classroom time was freed up to
concentrate on other areas, as
students gained knowledge about
old age in this active manner.
The students presented to a full
room of seniors. Word spread that
the nursing students from QCC
were in the house and giving a
health presentation, and in no
time, it was standing room only.
And they were a great audience!
They were interested and engaged
in the information and they
challenged us with some great
questions. The students felt
relaxed, and it showed in their
presentation. They answered
questions and provided some
great information that was useful
and practical. It was wonderful to
see our future nurses involved in
community service and career
development. This was a great
opportunity to combine our
learning outcomes with a
meaningful community service
experience. It truly was a win-win
occasion for all.
Many of our students are fortunate
enough to have family to guide them.
However, it is one of the ironic
contradictions of life that just at the
time when we need guidance during
adolescence, we arrogantly refuse to
accept it. This is especially true
when our own parents and
grandparents are giving us this
advice. The wisdom which people
gain slowly and painstakingly
through life experience, is a huge
asset. And yet, college-age young
adults scoff at the well-intentioned
wisdom their elders struggle to gain,
and pass along. The valuable
wisdom of the aged is better
accepted and actually cherished by
students if they have gone through
the active process of seeking it out.
There is something about actively
seeking knowledge, as compared to
passively, or even grudgingly,
receiving it. So, in addition to
improving students’ concrete course
knowledge, this method also helps
them gain some benefit of life
experience and wisdom from the
elderly among us.
The delightful surprise was to find
students’ reflection papers full of
wisdom and advice they gleaned
from these interactions. Many noted
changes in the way they intend to
make their life decisions based on
this advice.
Service-Learning in
EE-103
(CONTINUED FROM P. 3) that are
nearly always performed by
teams. Not only do engineers
need to make themselves
understood to each other, but to
management and other lesstechnically-trained people as well.
On December 9, 2014, Principal
Tu, Mary Bandziukas, College
Liaison Ashley Legitime, and 19
ninth-grade BTECH students
attended EE-103 student
presentations of solutions to
engineering design problems. Five
small groups of QCC students
were paired with five small groups
of 9th graders. After a period of
ten minutes, the 9th graders
moved on to the next group of
QCC students, until each group
had seen all five presentations. In
their post-session reflections my
students indicated that they
appreciated the new audience
and, since they gave their
presentations five times, were able
to improve and alter their own
talks with each new group.
The project was such a success
that I plan to have it as a part of
EE-103 every semester. This could
also be adapted to other classes
that would like their students to
interact with a high school
audience. The EE-103/BTECH
service-learning projects are
examples of what can be
expected. Different in scope, they
represent both typical and
unexpected experiences within
the field. Students learn that, as
always, there are many who will
be seeing their work, as it is part
of, and will impact, and ultimately
determine the outcome of a larger
project
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
PAGE 5
Faculty Voices, Continued
A Moment without Cell Phones
Hands-On Link
(CONTINUED FROM P. 3) Some of the interviews were
adapted by my students into research papers and then
digital stories. The second meeting took place near the
end of the semester. The CLIP students interviewed
my EN-101 students about their experiences as
matriculated students at Queensborough thus far.
Some students stuck to the scripted questions. For
many others, these topics were just a starting point,
and conversations ensued, with some hesitations,
about cars, video games, music, shopping, love life—
the interests both sets of students have in common.
Some pairs had serendipitous things in common: my
student Jin, who emigrated from South Korea when
she was a child, felt a strong connection to her CLIP
partner, Susu, from China since they are both mothers.
Jin noted: “by speaking with new people we learn to
express ourselves more, and help us find comfort in
our own skin.” Other students
their own experiences
“By speaking relived
learning English, long forgotten.
(CONTINUED FROM P. 3) which they did not know
existed and upon which they walk for the first time. On
campus, students, in a sense, see into the future as
they stare uphill along a proposed Tiger Trails route.
Role importance in the team is immediately sensed as
they begin their work towards making something
known to them by measuring. Minimum instructor
interaction creates an independent work environment,
enhancing a hands-on and more cohesive effort
between each member to complete the task. Students’
previous experience and field-notes make this
challenge more rewarding as they complete their work,
especially with the knowledge that it will be put to use
and recognized by someone else beyond the course.
with new
people,
we…find
comfort in
our own
skin.”
-EN-101 STUDENT
My student Monica Hernandez,
whose parents are from Mexico,
was placed in a bilingual
kindergarten classroom at age
five, not knowing any English. In
meeting with her Chinese CLIP
student partner, Monica wrote:
“speaking with Meiling was like
looking in a mirror. I saw myself
in Meiling when she stuttered or
paused, searching for the right
word.”
In their reflections, my EN-101 students described
their experience in terms of social and cultural capital,
workplace skills and John D. Mayer’s theory of
personal intelligence, concepts we studied in class.
The theme of face-to-face communication ran through
their work: Music major Jonathan Jones wrote that the
project “addressed a major community need for crosscultural communication” and that students “benefit
from less stereotypes and a better understanding of
others.” Jelaini Lantigua, herself a graduate of CLIP
and a Journalism major, bemoaned the ubiquity of
smart phone use: “communication is primordial—not
on the phone or social webs—but personally.” In
talking with her CLIP partner Jelaini felt “we got what
we wanted: a moment without cell phones, just two
normal people having a conversation.”
Service-learning rounds out course experience,
placing learned technology within the surrounding
environment. Becoming more aware of natural
surroundings promotes good stewardship, yielding
more careful and productive work. Additionally,
knowing and respecting the environment results in
good sustainable design. Often heard are students’
comments of environments they were unaware of that
exist in their midst. Today, this is the norm within the
architecture and construction industries.
Communication can never be compromised when it
comes to career advancement. Knowledge exchange
between each individual ensures complete
understanding, fostering speed with efficiency,
completing this work with a confidence boost on the
side. Mindful of expected errors, they are pointed out
as a learning tool with the knowledge that no one is
perfect and that when encountered in practice, they
can be corrected. This applies to anyone regardless of
performance level or differences as long as they do the
work.
Students working in Udalls Cove Park
PAGE 6
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
Project Spotlights
Poetry of Significant Objects
WITH SERVICE-LEARNING PARTNER BAYSIDE HIGH SCHOOL
Shortly after the beginning of the Fall 2014 semester, Prof. Tanya Zhelezcheva (EN-102)
and Bayside High School English teacher, Mrs. Vanessa Valente, met to develop a
service-learning project that would best suit the needs of all of their students. QCC
students were studying poetry that reflected their personal connection to a significant
object in their lives. Some students had shared their connections to these objects with
their classmates by bringing a significant object to class. These had included wedding
dresses, jewelry, and art objects. For weeks, the two educators prepared their students
to create their own poetry by studying poems about significant objects.
A student reads
original poetry to her
classmates
On October 9, 2014, the two classes met for the first time at QCC. The Bayside High
School students brought pictures of objects that are significant to them. Together, the
students worked to develop meaningful words that described the importance of these
objects in the younger students’ lives. After working through several activities, the high
school students were ready to present their poems. Surprisingly, many were more than
willing to read before the large gathering. “My partner made me so comfortable,” said
Bayside High School student, Ayana Smith. The teachers were delighted to note the
way the students encouraged each other to read their work.
After the poetry session, Edgar DeCastro, QCC Senior Admissions Counselor, gave the
visitors a tour of the campus which included the Queensborough Performing Arts Center
and the Kupferberg Holocaust Resource Center and Archives. The tour ended at the
pergola on the Great Lawn, where the students enjoyed lunch sitting under the sun in a beautiful setting. For
Bayside High School student, Giovani Villalobos, it was an eye-opening experience. He commented, “I got to learn
so much, and getting a tour of the campus was a pretty cool experience, too.” Mrs. Valente summed up the
experience by saying, “My students were very grateful to have the chance to do sophisticated work and meet some
cool new friends.”
Introducing STEM to the Oakland Gardens Community
BY MELODY TO, QCC NURSING STUDENT
As a current Nursing student, it has
encouraging younger students to pursue
been an honor to help the Oakland
STEM field occupations and college
Gardens community by participating in
degrees.
QCC campus activities. Prior to
Since taking the Biotechnology course, I
enrolling in QCC’s Nursing program, I
have worked closely with Dr. Gadura.
participated in several service-learning
Together, we established “I Love Science
projects for classes, some of which
Day,” a day where STEM-based clubs could
rewarded students with honors credit
rally together and share ideas. The servicefor the course. One of my favorite
learning component was to invite middle
projects was for my Biotechnology
schools within the community so that young
course, taught by Dr. Nidhi Gadura,
students could gain learning experiences
where we invited students from Hillcrest
Melody To
with the hands-on experiments and event
High School to three consecutive DNA
demonstrations. The most rewarding part
Fingerprinting Workshops. The goal of
about this academic service-learning
this service-learning project was to apply
contribution was not only to share my excitement
knowledge that we had learned in the classroom, while
about science, but to see the net positive results of our
efforts.
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
PAGE 7
Project Spotlights
Increasing STEM Knowledge among Students
WITH SERVICE-LEARNING PARTNERS SARATOGA FAMILY INN, ALLEY POND ENVIRONMENTAL CENTER (APEC),
SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY ENTRY PROGRAM (STEP) AND PROJECT PRIZE
Profs. Sharon Ellerton, Naydu Carmona and Areti
Tsimounis have implemented innovative servicelearning projects through honors contracts in Anatomy
and Physiology II. Since 2009, the honors/servicelearning faculty have incorporated a hands-on
experience in which QCC students lead workshops
and conduct lab activities with middle and high school
students. The goals are twofold: to create a strong
foundation in STEM for the QCC students and to peak
interest in STEM among younger students.
Together, the students build anatomical models and do
activities, dissections, and microscopy.
The STEP program, funded by the New York State
Education Department (NYSED), aims to improve
preparation of kids in grades 7 to 12 for STEM careers.
Project Prize, also funded by the NYSED, provides
programs for students at risk of dropping out. The
children increase their knowledge of science topics,
learn about their bodies in health and disease, and are
exposed to a college campus and college students.
During their courses, the
When the QCC students work off
QCC students spend
campus at APEC, they are trained
numerous hours preparing
to become “Nature Explainers”
for the workshops and
and assist in educational
activities by studying and
workshops in which they explain
researching anatomy and
the physiology of animals to
physiology topics, and by
children in grades K through 12. developing handouts, lab
Through the experience, the QCC
activities, working models,
students are provided an
and strategies to explain
opportunity to take leadership and
difficult concepts, all under
mentoring roles with the children.
the guidance of a faculty
One student remarked, “I was
mentor. The students then
drawn into the subjects of A & P
lead the workshops and
more deeply and developed a
experiments while
A scientist is born
better understanding of the
maintaining a reflection
concepts and materials studied in
journal. Finally, the students
class.” Another student noted, “…the
prepare a research paper which
workshops demanded our time,
they present at the QCC Honors Conference. commitment and persistence in our goals. I had to
The projects are conducted with four community
sharpen my skills of communication, learning
partners: Saratoga Family Inn, Alley Pond
capabilities and self-discipline.”
Environmental Center (APEC), Science and Technology
Dona Anderson, former Director of Programs and
Entry Program (STEP), and Project Prize. Many of the
Development for Homes for the Homeless,
children involved are low-income and enrolled in lowsummarized the many ways that the workshops fit the
resource middle and high schools across New York
mission of Saratoga Family Inn and benefit their
City.
“Getting them
children: “In addition to increasing the scientific
Saratoga Family Inn, the
thinking about
knowledge of our students, they get the added benefit
homeless shelter in
of not only visiting a college campus (a first for most of
college even as 6th largest
Queens, is a family shelter
our students), but also interacting with the QCC
and 7th graders is operated by Homes for the
students in a mentoring relationship. Our students can
Homeless. The children who
one intervention
ask the QCC students about college life, the QCC
that we can put into reside at the shelter are
campus and the process of going to college. They also
typically one to two years
have the valuable experience of getting to imagine and
place to break the behind in school knowledge.
envision themselves attending college, a dream that
cycle of
The workshops focus on the
seems unattainable to many of our students when they
homelessness and human body systems
first come to our facility. Getting them thinking about
including the respiratory,
poverty. ”
college even as 6th and 7th graders is one intervention
circulatory, digestive, and
that we can put into place to break the cycle of
human sensory systems.
-DONA ANDERSON
homelessness and poverty.”
PAGE 8
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
Service-Learning Awards and Grants
Hour Children: Student Service Pays Off
Business Professors and Business Honor Society Advisors Shele
Bannon and Kelly Ford received a grant in 2013-2014 from the
Association of College Honor Societies (ACHS), a community of
national and international honor societies. The ACHS award funds
programs to encourage cross-campus collaboration and new
initiatives among student organizations related to social
responsibility. QCC was one of four colleges to receive the grant.
Business students prepare for their
presentation on financial literacy
The QCC Business Honor Society—Alpha Beta Gamma (ABG), Xi
Chapter—participated in a two-semester-long service-learning
project with Hour Children, a non-profit organization location in Long
Island City that serves incarcerated and formerly incarcerated
women and their families. The project consisted of a food drive in Fall 2013 and a financial literacy workshop in
Spring 2014.
ABG collaborated with Phi Theta Kappa (PTK) Advisors Prof. Emily Tai and Prof. Paris Svoronos, who led the
drive effort with PTK students; seven campus clubs also joined the effort. This cross-campus project collected
ten boxes and nine bags of food for the Hour Children Food Pantry, which serves both Hour Children families
and residents from the surrounding Long Island City and Astoria communities. The project also raised campus
awareness of hunger and incarceration issues.
Under the leadership of Profs. Bannon and Ford, on April 23, 2014, Business students Luz Parra, Tracey
Morris, Jongchul Sah, and Daniela Tashima, made presentations on financial literacy at Hour Children based
on the needs identified by the organization’s staff. The presentation topics were budgeting, banking, identity
theft and educational opportunities, followed by engaging discussion with the participants. The families of Hour
Children were not the only beneficiaries of this project—participating students recognized how their academic
work contributed to their development as socially responsible professionals. The students also gained a sense
of confidence in their own expertise while providing guidance in the area of financial management, a subject
found to be extremely challenging for mothers emerging from incarceration.
Prof. Franca Ferrari Receives Special Act Award from
the U.S. Department of Justice
The Department of Justice Federal Bureau of
Prisons awarded QCC and Prof. Franca Ferrari,
Speech Communication and Theatre Arts, with a
Special Act Award for Prof. Ferrari’s service-learning
projects with Federal Correctional Institution (FCI)
Otisville, a medium-security federal correctional
institution for male inmates in Orange County, New
York.
Prof. Ferrari has completed, since Spring 2013,
several service-learning projects on developing the
communication and listening strategies of inmates
at FCI Otisville. Dr. Ferrari’s Speech Communication
students created a series of lectures for a group of inmates who serve as trainers
for the prison’s reentry program,
which helps inmates learn the
basics of public speaking for
the workplace. This lecture
series aims to satisfy the
Federal Bureau of Prisons
reentry program goals, including
developing inmates’ vocational,
interpersonal and academic
skills. Dr. Ferrari visited FCI
Otisville to train the inmates on
how to deliver the information
to the wider inmate audience.
Prof. Ferrari’s
Special Act Award
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
PAGE 9
Fall 2014
In Pictures
Clockwise from top left: Prof. Bentley’s Nursing
class at Hillcrest Senior Center, Dr. Robert Franco
from Kapi’olani speaks to staff and faculty, Prof.
Petersen’s biology students guide lab activities for
visiting students from Holy Martyrs Armenian Day
School, Prof. Davis’ Engineering Technology
students take measurements, Prof. Vogel’s speech
students give tours of the Kupferberg Holocaust
Resource Center and Archives, a student in Prof.
Drini’s computer programming class shows off his
handiwork, Prof. Katz’s English class after their
poetry workshop
PAGE 10
VOLUME VI, ISSUE I
Community Partners Fall 2014
We thank our community partners in
Fall 2014 for working with our students:
Catholic Charities Brooklyn and Queens
FCI Otisville
Saratoga Family Inn
Udalls Cove Preservation Committee
Zone 126
Schools
Bayside High School
Benjamin N. Cardozo High School
BTECH Early College High School
Hillcrest High School
William Cullen Bryant High School
World Journalism Preparatory School
Community Voices Middle School 356
Divine Wisdom Catholic Academy
Holy Martyrs Armenian Day School
CUNY Law School
Welcome to our new partners
Through Zone 126, the OASL connected with
William Cullen Bryant High School—a new
school partner this semester. QCC health
students presented to the high school students
on healthy living. The students also toured the
campus through the OASL’s Getting Young
Minds Excited about College program.
QCC Nursing students presented to middle
school students in Community Voices Middle
School 356 about hygiene and their changing
bodies (grades 6 and 7) and about pregnancy
prevention and STIs (grade 8).
Freshmen from Business Technology Early
College High School (BTECH) visited with
QCC electrical engineering students to see
how the QCC students used MATLAB, a
mathematical programming language and
environment, to solve engineering design
problems. Read about this project on page 3.
Academic Service-Learning at a Glance - Fall 2014
Faculty
QCC Offices and Programs
Community
Partners
Classes
Students
Academic
Departments
Number of
42
28
51
783
11
After School Academy
Participants
Academic Literacy Learning Center
Buildings and Grounds
QCC Office of Academic Service-Learning
CLIP
222-05 56th Avenue
Environmental Health and Safety
Humanities Building, Room 246
Health Services
Bayside, NY 11364
Kupferberg Holocaust Resource Center 718.281.5612
servicelearning@qcc.cuny.edu
and Archives
www.qcc.cuny.edu/servicelearning
Queensborough Performing Arts Center
Support for the development and production of this material was
Project Prize
provided by a grant under the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical
Single Stop
Education Act of 2006 administered by the New York State
We Are QCC
Education Department.
Academic Service-Learning Director: Josephine Pantaleo
Faculty Liaison: Dr. Sharon Ellerton
Perkins Project Coordinators: Arlene Kemmerer, Mary Bandziukas,
Cristina Di Meo
Project Coordinators: Diana Silvestri, Helen Massan, Eugene Sedita