Campus celebrates community engagement
Cultivating connections in the local community is a priority for New College students, staff and faculty.
To honor those who have gone above and beyond this fall, the Office of Outreach and Inclusive Excellence is hosting virtual mid-year celebration and award ceremony from 4 to 5 p.m. Thurs. Dec. 10.
The three awardees are: Uzi Baram, Ph.D., professor of anthropology and heritage studies; Jada McNeill, assistant director for the office of Student Activities & Campus Engagement (SA[u]CE); and Antonia Ginsberg-Klemmt, a third-year student and founder of New College’s rowing team, New Crew SRQ.
Event attendees will learn about New College’s Andrew W. Mellon Foundation initiatives, such as the Sarasota-Manatee Arts & Humanities Internship Program, the “Visions of the Black Experience” film festival, the “Cinema and Social Justice” Independent Study Project (ISP), and the partnership with the Multicultural Health Institute. Other upcoming programming, including the radiant communities summer institute, and plans for the January interterm and Black History Month, will also be discussed.
To register for the event, visit eventbrite.com/e/mellon-mid-year-celebration-tickets-129546891239 or click here
Learn more about the award recipients:
Faculty Awardee: Uzi Baram
Baram is a professor of anthropology and heritage studies at New College, as well as the director of the New College Public Archaeology Lab. A faculty member since 1997, Baram committed to public engagement early in his New College career. With expanding community support, he led projects that involved surveying the Rosemary Cemetery and the Little Salt Spring area, and excavating at the Venice Train Depot and the Crowley Museum & Nature Center. Those experiences with enthusiastic community members and motivated undergraduates led to experimenting with radical openness—sharing the research process with students, community partners and the general public through lectures, workshops, films, video games and interviews (as well as offering manuscripts for peer-reviewed publications). The success of those approaches led to a partnership with Sarasota County known as the Community Heritage Awareness and Management Program (CHAMP), and the long-term community-based “Looking for Angola”program that disseminates insights into the early 19th-century marronage on the Manatee River.
Staff Awardee: Jada McNeill
McNeill is an assistant director for the SA[u]CE office and a recipient of the 2019 President’s Volunteer Service Award. McNeill came to New College two years ago, bringing with her a wealth of experience in community outreach and public health. She holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville; and a master of public health degree from Tennessee State University. She also interned at the American Lung Association and was a research study interviewer at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. McNeill started at New College as the volunteer coordinator for AmeriCorps VISTA (a national service program designed to alleviate poverty), and supervised operations for the New College Food Pantry. She coordinated volunteer opportunities for students, faculty and staff, with the focus on service opportunities related to poverty alleviation through addressing food insecurity. McNeill and her colleagues at SA[u]CE strive to create a supportive community where students can “make a positive difference, develop healthy and meaningful relationships with others, and are empowered to take action, learn about themselves, and develop leadership and lifelong skills.”
Student Awardee: Antonia Ginsberg-Klemmt
Ginsberg-Klemmt is a French- and German-speaking, mermaid-loving third-year student at New College who is studying marine/ocean physics. She grew up in Sarasota, started rowing in seventh grade, and has been rowing ever since. In her senior year of high school, she represented Sarasota Crew’s Women’s Lightweight 8+ at the USRowing Youth National Championships of 2018 (and won first in the C final, placing her boat at 13th in the nation). She founded Sarasota’s collegiate rowing club team known as New Crew SRQ, which allows students within the Cross College Alliance to row on the same team. She raised enough money to purchase three used 2002 4+ rowing shells (which fit four rowers and one coxswain each). Along with her father, Achim, she spent months welding, repairing and refurbishing the rowing boats to get them into a workable condition. She has been coaching New Crew rowers five to six days a week, weather permitting. Ginsberg-Klemmt organized New Crew’s participation at the “Duel in the Swamp” race in Gainesville, as well as the team’s first local race at Nathan Benderson Park at the “Head of the Hog.” Sarasota is considered the rowing capital of the United States thanks to Nathan Benderson Park, so the New College team is currently in the process of working on a partnership with Benderson (which would allow New Crew would to row and practice at the facility, located only 15 minutes away from the New College campus).