Sarasota YMCA Honors
Its New College Partner
'Preparing for College' program for Black, Hispanic Achievers
awarded
(May 25, 2007)
– For the second year in a row, New College of Florida has
received the Outstanding Community Partner Award from the Sarasota
Family YMCA for its collaborative "Preparing for College" program
with the YMCA's Black and Hispanic Achievers Program.
The award was presented at the Sarasota YMCA's 17th annual Achievers
Recognition Breakfast, held May 25 at the Sarasota Hyatt.
The glass award recognizes New College for its "efforts to educate
and elevate the children of this community."
Begun in fall 2005, the Preparing for College program partners New
College of Florida staff and student mentors with middle- and
high-school students in the Black and Hispanic Achievers Program.
New College staff developed the semester-long program to help guide
the Achievers into higher education. At monthly YMCA Family Nights,
sessions for Achievers and their parents were conducted on such
topics as technical, community-college and state-university
opportunities, life skills, rèsumè writing and financial aid.
High-school seniors received guidance on composing personal essays
for their college and scholarship applications from New College's
Writing Resource Center director and, subsequently, the seniors'
draft essays were critiqued by the center's student writing
assistants, who gave the high-school students feedback for
improvement. And, the Financial Aid staff helped seniors and their
families simplify the daunting process of submitting their
applications for federal financial aid.
Accepting the award for New College were Suzanne Janney, special
assistant to the president, who developed and initiated the Preparing
for College program; Graham Bier, assistant to the dean of students
and coordinator of the 2006-07 program; Cathy Cuthbertson, director
of Career Services and Off-Campus Studies; and Sonia Wu, associate
director of admissions for multicultural and transfer recruitment.
Pictured (l to r): Graham Bier,
Suzanne Janney, Cathy Cuthbertson and Sonia Wu. In the top photo,
Bier holds the Outstanding Community Partner award from the local
YMCA.
