For many kids, a trip to the beach conjures up memories of sand castles and sunscreen. Todd Goddard remembers the medical waste on the Jersey shore. <div id="story_quote_w9GGbIWetQ" class="inline-content pull_quote right"> “I was almost completely clueless about renewable energy, but I cannot stress how much I learned. I also learned how to incorporate renewable energy, politics, and politeness into a strong, concise letter to the editor. So far, I’ve been published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and The Capital Times.” Jordyn Poad </div> “I’ll never forget those beach-closing warnings. I remember waking up and listening to the radio to hear which beaches were OK. We’d walk down to the beach and see hypodermic needles and gauze bandages sticking out of the sand. Ships would just dump it off the coast.” Now a <abbr class="initialism" title="Doctor of Philosophy">Ph.D.</abbr> student in literary studies, Goddard has found a way to unite his concern for the environment with his teaching. In his section of English 201, he provides 16 students with real-world communications experience while giving 11 local nonprofits some much-needed help. In the process, he helps increase environmental awareness among his students and the audiences they serve. While other writing-intensive courses may emphasize composition skills within a particular discipline (such as literature), the 13 sections of English 201 each use a distinct theme to relate the same goal: providing intermediate composition students with the opportunity to develop skills in reading, writing, speaking, and listening. Several sections of 201 involve service-learning components. In addition to providing a comprehensive experience for students, it also allows experienced teaching assistants the flexibility to design and create their own courses — a crucial skill for those aiming for an academic career. For Goddard, English 201 offered the perfect way for him to lead a service-learning course. He applied to teach the course in the spring of 2008 with a proposal to the course’s director; this spring marks his second semester at the helm. As he sought service-learning partners, Goddard discovered that many environmental organizations faced the same questions and challenges that his students faced in class. How do writers use writing and rhetorical strategies to influence various audiences? How can organizations package a message to diverse readerships in diverse media in diverse ways? “Several groups said, ‘Wow, that’s a perfect fit. We face those questions every day, and they’re some of the most challenging things we face,’” recalls Goddard. “They communicate those ideas to experts, boards of directors, the general public and potential donors. They’re using e-mails, newsletters, brochures, Web sites, everything; they always have to adjust how they write about their ideas.” In the classroom, Goddard uses classic environmental texts and documentaries as springboards for discussion, choosing writers with a wide range across the 20th century. While Rachel Carson’s mid-century masterpiece “Silent Spring” has a specific target and an activist bent — inciting its readers to change — Annie Dillard’s more recent “Pilgrim at Tinker Creek” presents a less strident slant while focusing intently on a sense of place. Wisconsin’s own Aldo Leopold’s “Sand County Almanac” splits the difference, interweaving the story of his farm with an ending polemic on the state of the land. Goddard values not only the variety of examples but the depth of interaction. “There are no sacred cows in class. They’re not afraid to really challenge authors, their ideas and their styles. We get into some heated and intense discussions.” By all accounts, this combination of reading and writing has proven a success. For tiny nonprofits with few staff members, the help is invaluable; they return the favor by eschewing busy work and giving students active roles — roles that have paid off. “Last semester, I had students in different organizations all working to some extent on the same issue,” says Goddard. “Toward the end of the semester, the proposal in question was rejected, so they got a great chance to see the arc from the beginning of the semester to the end. I think they felt a pretty intense sense of accomplishment from having participated, and from seeing how that process worked — influencing a broad audience and a smaller audience, like the boards that were deciding this issue, to prevent a substantial change.” Students agree. Jordyn Poad had barely arrived on campus as a new transfer student when she found herself immersed in volunteer work for <a href="http://www.cleanwisconsin.org/">Clean Wisconsin</a>. Despite the challenge of acclimating to both a new campus and an organization she knew little about, she deeply appreciates the support she’s received in and out of class. “I was almost completely clueless about renewable energy, but I cannot stress how much I learned,” says Poad. “I also learned how to incorporate renewable energy, politics, and politeness into a strong, concise letter to the editor. So far, I’ve been published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and The Capital Times.” “Todd put this together all on his own. He’s amazingly committed,” says Mary Fiorenza, coordinator for English 201 and herself a former 201 instructor. “Students look for his class now; some of them don’t necessarily know what they’re in for, but as they get acclimated they really dig in.” For Fiorenza, this kind of experience cements the aims of English 201. “Todd gives his students a real audience to write for, not just an imagined one. It’s great.” Ph.D. student in literary studies Todd Goddard has found a way to unite his concern for the environment with his teaching. In his section of English 201, he provides 16 students with real-world communications experience while giving 11 local nonprofits some much-needed help. In the process, he helps increase environmental awareness among his students and the audiences they serve. Course adds to environmental awareness 16590 2009-04-22T10:11:00-05:00

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For the second year in a row, the Corporation for National and Community Service has honored the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a place on the <a href="http://www.nationalservice.gov/honorroll">President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll</a> for exemplary service efforts and service to America's communities. Launched in 2006, the Community Service Honor Roll is the highest federal recognition a university can achieve for its commitment to service-learning and civic engagement. Schools apply for the honor and are judged based on the scope and innovation of their service projects, the percentage of student participation in service activities, incentives for service and the extent to which the school offers service-learning courses. UW-Madison currently offers dozens of service-learning courses through the continually expanding <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/">Morgridge Center for Public Service</a>. The center, as well as hundreds of campus fraternities, sororities and student organizations, promotes volunteering and community service. The university was one of 546 schools honored. Madison's Edgewood College also made the honor roll list. "I'm truly thrilled that we've received this national recognition — two years in a row -for all the great service-learning and community-based research that our students are doing," says Aaron Brower, vice provost for teaching and learning. "The staff at the Morgridge Center can feel very proud of what they've accomplished." "Any success the center has is due to our ability to help marshal the concerns and dedication of many communities who understand the idea of the commonwealth," says Michael Thornton, professor of Afro-American studies and faculty director of the Morgridge Center. "Any recognition we receive must be seen as the work of many people, on and off campus, who create coalitions to bring us closer to what our country should be all about: hope, fairness and justice for us all," he adds. For the second year in a row, the Corporation for National and Community Service has honored the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a place on the President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll for exemplary service efforts and service to America's communities. UW-Madison receives national service award 16245 2009-02-09T11:02:00-06:00

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Since returning home I have been thinking about our experience in Belize and just how valuable each activity was — for us as students and faculty, and, according to the SNAT members at our final dinner with them this past Friday, to the community of Punta Gorda. The school visits: We were able to have contact with children and sensitize them to the many things people with disabilities can do. Our faculty was also able to speak with some of the teachers and make contacts with the special needs instructors (who have no formal instruction, but improvise how to treat in a classroom) and follow up to offer suggestions of how to better work with children in the classroom. This also opened our eyes to how different each school was. It was obvious which schools tended to send more children to high school and college vs. the ones where education usually stops after sixth grade. The community talks allowed us to speak one-on-one with families from the Punta Gorda area who had concerns about family members and were searching for new answers. We had to think on our feet as students; the faculty offered further information and suggestions to ease quality of life and further progress children; everyone shared personal stories of caring for a loved one with autism, cerebral palsy, a stroke or an intellectual impairment. Holding an ortho clinic opened our eyes to some of the common injuries of workers in Punta Gorda. Everything was a work-related injury from poor mechanics, a trauma or from overuse for years. One example of something I think is taken for granted in the U.S. is the accessibility of surgery — if you have severe osteoarthritis you will have some form of a knee replacement and then have another when your first wears out — but unless a family has resources to go to another country and they are able to miss work, that family member will continue working on their degenerating joints as long as they live. Home visits opened our eyes to not only the living quarters of some of the families in Punta Gorda, but also the warmth among family members, which was demonstrated to us in spite of not always being able to comply with therapy. There were three families that I saw that stood out to me: One man with a stroke who complied 100 percent but was probably not able to ever return to Placencia to fish with his son; one family with three children with completely different forms of cerebral palsy — that mother was always doing laundry, feeding her children or cooking for her family from scratch, including squeezing coconut shavings for milk to make tortillas; and, finally, one boy who had some form of muscular dystrophy who was completely normal cognitively but because there were 11 children in this family, including one newborn, this 16-year-old has been lying in a bed (cardboard on a wood bed frame) for the past five years and is not afraid to sit up although he needs position changes to avoid sores and infections. What other class experience could offer this sort of real-life eye-opening? Adapting a wheelchair with few resources was a lot of fun, because you had to think on your feet and improvise. Everyone who gets a wheelchair gets the same generic seating system, so armed with Velcro, foam, kitchen knives, a sewing kit and various types of cloth, we made a chair more supportive for a girl with no trunk or head/neck control. What struck me about the storage shed was how much wonderful equipment was donated! Unfortunately, there were a lot of supplies that were not appropriate for the possible services provided at the clinics. Now there is a wish list for therapy supplies so hopefully there will be more applicable to therapy and medical needs in Punta Gorda. For example, there are not many tennis-elbow problems or casting that goes on at the clinics, but there were a lot of supplies for both. There is no other way I can imagine learning so much in so short a time. I do hope students next year are able to return with some further tweaking of the schedule — not just for the students, but for some continuity of care for the families we saw, and for the special needs instructors to continue better serving students. This was a fantastic experience and I am so thankful I was able to go! Sally Jan. 16, 2009 I wanted to take this opportunity to discuss the two site improvement projects we are completing here at Hillside, which were funded by our student organization, Phi Theta, and a couple of the faculty. The two projects are building a wheelchair ramp for the clinic and repairing some termite damaged walls of the medical supply storage building. The resident handyman, Evert (who also happens to be the local mayor), has been instrumental in getting the projects underway. The building that houses the medical supplies is two stories with the second floor serving as living quarters for full-time volunteers. Like many buildings in the area, it is constructed of large steel-reinforced concrete pillars that support the second floor. Since they frequently receive heavy rainfall, homes in low lying areas won't have the first floor finished off to avoid damage from flood waters. The clinic is on a side of a hill, so in a relatively dry spot. The walls between the pillars were initially constructed of untreated lumbar and termites have spent the last several years hollowing them out to the point where the paint on the outside is about the only thing holding them together. Prior to replacing the walls with treated lumbar, we took on the tedious task of cleaning, taking inventory and organizing the building and medical supplies. Since the walls are non-weight bearing, they are actually quite simple to replace. Some priority maintenance issues like leaky faucets and a huge infestation of fleas under the dorm from all of the mangy dogs that sleep under there to stay dry have set back the building project, but we should easily be able to finish that tomorrow. A ramp to the clinic was definitely needed because they previously had been lifting patients up the steps to the building if they were wheelchair bound. Evert poured the ramp today with one of his friends. We were in Punta Gorda all day conducting an orthopedic clinic at the hospital and home visits in town so I, unfortunately, didn't get to help with that project. I can take solace in the fact that I did get to design the layout of the ramp and it looks great, if I do say so myself. Ed Jan. 16, 2009 Well, our time in Belize is nearing the end. We have had lots of rain — in fact we learned late on Wednesday there is a bridge out between Punta Gorda and Belize City (4 hours away). That is the only paved road. Luckily we have been able to book a flight on a very small plane from Punta Gorda to Belize City. We will be in a total of five different airports tomorrow! We were able to join a Mayan family (11 children!!!) for a tortilla and basket making demonstration. I think I was better at the tortilla making than the basket making — both were more challenging than they looked. We had lunch (we ate the tortilla's we made!) and headed back to our village. There was another round of home visits and an ortho clinic at the hospital. We have managed to stay very busy despite the rain! Tonight is our final event with SNAT. We are looking forward to celebrating the success of our two week venture into this beautiful country. The experience has been full of twists and turns. The students have been a stellar group. They have represented our university with honor, and I have been proud to share these two weeks of their lives. The faculty were a constant source of information and challenges — the students rose to every challenge and in the end will be better physical therapists! Probably most important — each of us on this trip has been impacted. Whether it was a client, a community member, a student or a nurse — we have been touched by the people of Belize. We are all looking forward to our return to Wisconsin! See you soon. Lori Jan. 14, 2009 Hello again! Yesterday was the day that we got to see how our wheelchair creations worked for the children. We got Brittany into her wheelchair so that she was safe and able to hold her head up. We took her for a walk down the street. We were told that her mom was tearing up. It will be such a relief for her to not have to hold her all day and be able to take her into the community. We also had to make some modifications to a stroller for another child, Svena. This was more challenging, as we had to problem-solve what adaptations we needed to make on site and with only the equipment we brought with us. Needless to say, there was a lot of trial and error before we found something that would work for her. It is not perfect but we have someone to follow up with her after we leave, and our modifications are an improvement. Her stroller is now safer, and she is positioned better in it. <div id="story_image_1061" class="inline-content photo right" style="width: 230px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1061/Brittanychair.jpg" alt=" " /> Ed, Becca and Rachel with Brittany after modifications to her chair. </div> We have seen so many parents here that have been so dedicated to helping their children even though there are such limited resources. Both of the families that we made the modifications for had attended our adult-education sessions to better understand how to help their children. The simple modifications and minimal education that we gave them were able to make such a huge difference in their lives and improve the comfort and safety of their children. See you in three days! Becca, Ed, Rachel and Sally Jan. 14, 2009 Greetings. A quick note: I was able to accompany the students and faculty into three homes to bring equipment to assist the children. There were at times six of us crowded into very little space. The families always were welcoming and friendly — sharing what little space they had with us. One family has three children with disabilities. The disabilities range from moderate to severe. None of the children are able to walk. Only one can sit. The home is small, perhaps 12-by-12. It had three beds and a little space to walk around, but nothing else. The students worked with each of the three children and eventually persuaded Tanika to get into a wheelchair. The students also created a positioning pillow for the other children to assist them in sitting. It was powerful to watch the children respond to the hands-on approach of the students. Take care, Lori Jan. 13, 2009 Greetings again from Sally, As time rolls on here in Belize, the biggest culture shock for me, has been with regards to the sense of time here and keeping a schedule — or lack thereof. It has become a running joke in the group when making plans that, for example, we will do the community talks from 4-5 p.m. Belizean time, which means we will probably start at least 30 minutes late, and people will roll in even later, and many people remain after the talk to engage more. An example of this could be today, while trying to plan our day when we planned to start building the wheelchair ramp and organize the storage shed full of physical therapy supplies, our schedule ended up being planned out as, “We’ll do what we need in town in the morning, maybe start organizing or maybe eat lunch and organize in the afternoon, then finish up MacGyvering a wheelchair as able — or whatever we do not get done today we can to tomorrow or Wednesday...” <div id="story_image_1043" class="inline-content photo right" style="width: 200px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1043/Belize09363wheelchair.jpg" alt=" " /> UW group members pose near a wheelchair that they helped to modify. </div> Maybe we are absorbing the laid-back culture? Maybe our schedule is getting lighter? It has amazed me that everything we planned to get done has been done, so far — especially with our group being the first group of physical therapists from the UW down here. The sitting and waiting mentality and just letting what happens happen does make for a minimally stressful environment. This could be a result of the hot and humid climate coupled with poverty paired with malnutrition — the culmination of which lends to a more laid-back atmosphere. One of the hopes in doing our adult education sessions was to get people to realize that there are many other families with children with disabilities and to help give them a voice — to help stand up for their children. Families want to be proactive and get together to actually make something happen for their children but are not sure how to or the struggle of their daily lives to not allow them to do so. If <abbr title="The Special Needs Association of Toledo">SNAT</abbr> (The Special Needs Association of Toledo) becomes a stronger presence in the community, then perhaps something like this could happen. One of our goals of this trip was to assist SNAT in building their reputation in the Toledo district. I hope we are able to lay the foundation and help get the ball rolling! Sally Jan. 12, 2009 On Friday morning (Jan. 9), we did our last school visit at the Little Flower School. Again it was a school outside of Punta Gorda, and all of the kids were very well-behaved and interactive. They had one student with a disability, and it was heart-warming to see how the other kids interacted and included him in everything. Needless to say, they were well-experienced in maneuvering the wheelchair. While reading books to the students and asking questions they were quick to respond. When asked what kind of music they thought the characters were dancing to, they exclaimed, “Punta Rock!” This weekend we got a well-deserved break and headed out to an island off of Belize called Lime Caye. It truly was a piece of paradise once we got there. The boat ride was rough and left us with sore backs and bruised bottoms. On the island we swam with the fishes, sat on the beach, snorkeled, went island hopping, built a bonfire, made “Belizean s’mores” (consisting of cookies, chocolate frosting and marshmallows) and held a morning pilates session on the beach. Our guide was very knowledgeable of the area and talked of the struggles to keep the reef and Belizean waters beautiful for years to come. Many unknowing visitors will drop anchor not knowing where the reef is and ruin the beautiful sea life. He viewed these visitors in a bittersweet light. He also talked about the struggle between Belize and Guatemala and how progress is still to come. Like everyone we have met here, the Belizeans were proud to share their culture and love of the land and sea. On Sunday evening (Jan. 11), after a much smoother boat ride home, the bronzed physical therapy crew went straight back to work adapting a wheelchair for a child seen the week before. With limited supplies we constructed a seating system, head support, lateral supports, foot support and seatbelt for the chair. Everything was handmade with love, right down to the Velcro stitched on with a mini-sewing kit. It’s amazing what you can come up with when you put many creative minds together. We think the little girl will love it. We have a busy week ahead of us, and we are happy to be safe from the snow emergencies at home! Becca and Rachel Jan. 12, 2009 In reflecting on my experience with the people of Belize thus far, I would have to say that I have been both a little surprised and impressed. I have been to several poor countries in my life, and Belize certainly isn’t the poorest of them, but there seems to be a very different attitude here. That is to say that a very common theme I have seen in other countries is people with extended hands begging for money or pushing really hard to try to sell you something. In these engagements I have felt very little acknowledgement of me as a person, with the only focus being on the possibility that I may have money, and they must employ their best strategy to get me to part with it. <div id="story_image_1045" class="inline-content photo span" style="width: 550px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1045/Belizehouse-horse.jpg" alt=" " /> A home near Punta Gorda, Belize. </div> I completely understand that many of those people may be in a desperate situation, but I get frustrated with the lack of sustainable independent means that exists with handouts. This is the idea of give me a fish and you feed me for a day, teach me to fish and you feed me for a lifetime. What I have seen from the people of Punta Gorda is the kind of friendliness seen only in small towns in the U.S. on occasion. As I walk down the street, nearly everyone smiles and says hello. I get feeling that people have a sense of community and are welcoming to outsiders. In the five home visits for therapy services I have completed thus far, I have been very impressed with how welcoming and hospitable the patients and their families have been. Most of them are very poor and have had debilitating conditions for a long time, yet seem to have a positive attitude. One possible reason for this is that they seem to have strong family support, with the whole family interested in the activities we do with their family member and what they can do to help. I wouldn’t go as far as saying that all Belizeans are kind and caring, but certainly the positive benefits they reap from doing so may be a valuable reminder to the people in the U.S. Ed Jan. 12, 2009 It is Monday, the beginning of our second week. The time has flown and stood still at the same time. The students and faculty have done clinics, given community education sessions, visited four different schools and participated in home visits with the Belizean people. The work has been rewarding and draining. We left at 8 a.m. for a day and a half of fun on an island off the coast of Belize. It is owned by the Belizean government and leased to a family to run a primitive camping resort. It was a 1.5-hour boat ride to the island. The water was rough, and I was glad to have taken my motion-sickness pills! <div id="story_image_1041" class="inline-content photo right" style="width: 200px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1041/TheshackonLimeCaye.jpg" alt=" " /> A camping shack on Lime Caye. </div> Once on the island — it was beautiful. White sand, crystal-clear water in hues of vivid blue and green — just what you would expect in the Caribbean! The accommodations were sparse, and as we learned in the middle of the night, a little creaky, but overall the experience was a positive one! My highlights include seeing a nurse shark and two stingrays while snorkeling and seeing hundreds of large conch shells in brilliant shades of pink all along the shore. We were able to have a shoreline fire complete with s’mores to really punctuate the day. Time to get back to work. See ya in a week! Lori Jan. 10, 2009 On Friday (Jan. 9), our group went to the Little Flower School. It is a little outside the city of Punta Gorda. The principal, Ms. Pacule, was a student at the school when she was little. She reflected on the changes with me. The structure of the classrooms has changed (they built a new school in the ’70s), the role of the teachers has evolved: All the teachers at Little Flower have their associate degree or their bachelor’s degree, the parental involvement has increased, and lastly — but probably most importantly — the students have changed. As Ms. Pacule talked, she remarked on how television has influenced the children and how they can be introduced to so many more things via the Internet. The school does not yet have Internet, but many of the students have been introduced to it via other means. In my discussion with Ms. Pacule, she mentioned corporal punishment as another change that has impacted the schools. Contrary to Sally’s post, I learned the only person in the school who can initiate “lashing” is the principal. Ms. Pacule indicated that is seldom, if ever, used. She also stated that corporal punishment is frowned upon by the community and the families. More specifically, she tries to counsel the child and determine what is at the root of the issue. Sometimes it is worry, sometimes it is hunger. Sometimes the child had a dispute with another family member prior to coming to school, but the essence is to go beyond the initial behavior to what may lay below the surface. I felt the conversation was insightful. The Little Flower School also does extremely well in athletic engagement as well as academic achievement. Many people in the community want to have their children attend Little Flower because of the success at the school. After meeting some of the teachers and the principal, it is clear they are committed to the evolution of learning in every child. This weekend we are off to Lime Caye (pronounced KEY) for a few days of rest and relaxation. More later! Lori Jan. 9, 2009 Greetings! I found a bit of time in our busy schedule to write again. I am beginning to realize how much we take the simple things for granted in the U.S. We have done a number of home visits and school visits by now and have a better grasp of the true poverty of the area and how the people here have learned to live with very little. <div id="story_image_1033" class="inline-content photo right" style="width: 175px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1033/Rachel-working-with-PG-Methodist-students.jpg" alt=" " /> Rachel Wise works with students at the Punta Gorda Methodist School. The group has been teaching students about tools that people with injuries or chronic conditions can use to regain their mobility. </div> First, the homes that we have visited have been just as much of a cultural shock sort of experience as it has been a learning one. We have learned that when we head out on a home visit, you never know what you may encounter. We have seen everything from cinder-block homes with minimal mattresses on the floor and buckets for a bathroom to multi-room dwellings with full plumbing and stoves. However, no matter where we have gone, we have been welcomed very warmly into each person’s home. It is as if money is not a factor here. Some people have more money, but the town seems fairly safe. There is more of a sense of community and family, and everyone helps each other survive. On the other hand, while everyone has a system of support, it has not been uncommon for neighbors to not know one another. How this is possible in such close quarters is unclear to us, but this is just what we have observed. Our school visits have been somewhat like a comparison between small town and inner-city schools in the U.S. The first school visit at St. Benedict’s was a good example of the appropriate amount of discipline from the teachers. The kids were easy to work with, followed directions and were very polite. <div id="story_image_1035" class="inline-content photo span" style="width: 550px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1035/St-Bernedettes-School.jpg" alt=" " /> Rachel Wise poses for a class photo with students at St. Bernadette’s School. </div> As we went to the schools in the town of Punta Gorda, we were warned ahead of time that the students have a reputation for being unruly and wild. We were then instructed to implement strict order and rules in our school visits and gradually allow more freedom if they are behaving well. This left the impression with some of us students that these children were perhaps “not good kids” or troublemakers, and we went into these other schools with a preconceived notion. We did not find these kids to be any different than children anywhere else. It was more that their instructors did not allow them to be kids and laugh and play as normal children like to do. For example, it is acceptable here for children to still get lashed on their arms if they misbehave. Also, we noticed in the last school we visited that when the teachers were at our activity stations, the children became silent and were reluctant to engage, but loosened up and responded more freely once the instructors were gone. Another example was while I was showing the children how to use crutches on some stairs. Some students had difficulty ascending — some of the classmates giggled at the student who was having some trouble, but the teacher immediately stepped in and scolded them for laughing and asked, “When you see someone with crutches on the streets, are you going to laugh at them?” After that, the children did not laugh anymore, but were serious about just going up and down the stairs. When we visit the schools, yes, we hope that the children learn and take away a message that people with disabilities can do great things and should be treated as any other able-bodied person, but also we hope that they enjoy themselves and have some fun. Not to be a downer and leave the impression that conditions are terrible and people are cruel here, but it is just very different — not necessarily bad or good, just different than my experience in the U.S. One final commentary on the schools is that everyone wears a uniform, and, in at least two of the schools, the children were not allowed to speak Creole. Schooling is also only reuired through the sixth grade, then if you wish to continue you have to pay. It seems to me that this would discourage further education past this sixth-grade level and it has not appeared, so far, that education is much of a priority around here. Many people mostly work odd jobs to support their family. For example, our tour guide through the Blue Creek Cave was a farmer, a tour guide and a spelunker, demonstrating that study of a specific trade is not necessary as you will likely have many odd jobs throughout your life. He even appeared very well off in comparison to many of the other families we have seen. If only there was a way for more people to get encouragement to continue with their education — especially considering the need for skilled workers, such as nurses, doctors and especially special-education teachers. Perhaps if there was more of this focus on education, some of those who are really in need could be better served in the community. OK, I’m not sure how to end this, but we have to head to another school visit. I hope this better paints a picture of what we have observed. Until next time, Sally <div id="story_image_1039" class="inline-content photo span" style="width: 550px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1039/PG-Methodist-Students.jpg" alt=" " /> Students from the Punta Gorda Methodist School. </div> <div id="story_image_1037" class="inline-content photo span" style="width: 550px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1037/St.-Peter-Claver-School-Library.jpg" alt=" " /> The library at St. Peter Claver School outside Punta Gorda. </div> Jan. 8 Yesterday (Jan. 7), we visited Punta Gorda Methodist School to do another presentation about disabilities. The children were around 14 years old. All the kids were very excited to try out the wheelchair and crutches. Many of the students have grandparents or other family members using them at home. They practiced and played in them on the sidewalks and some could pop some awesome wheelies! All of them were very excited to try out a steep ramp in the wheelchair and stairs with the crutches. While watching the video, students were very interactive and excited about discussing the topic. The most amusing part of the school visits is that the students aren’t allowed to call us by our first names only. So we are known as Miss Becca, Mr. Ed, Miss Rachel and Miss Sally! <div id="story_image_1031" class="inline-content photo span" style="width: 550px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1031/Belize-09-190.jpg" alt=" " /> Students at Punta Gorda Methodist School try out crutches as part of a presentation about disabilities. </div> In addition to the school sessions, we have also been participating in home visits to individuals in the community. So far we have seen children with varying diagnoses, including seizure disorders, cerebral palsy and severe autism. We also have seen some adults, including a woman with severe rheumatoid arthritis and a gentleman recovering from a stroke. So far all the patients and their families have been very receptive and welcoming. As students, we have found this to be a very rewarding experience. To end the day today we led a discussion on stroke. Much of the information seemed helpful to the community members, and they were eager to ask questions to help better understand stroke. A hot topic of discussion was how to start and maintain an exercise program and modify their diet due to the fact that much of their food is fried. We helped them all to calculate their target heart rate and gave them tips for safe exercising in this hot weather! Our time here is not all work, of course! Some of the amazing things we have had the chance to try are papaya milkshakes, fresh lime juice (Lori is becoming an expert in the science of lime juice-making) and Johnny cakes. We also occasionally relax with a stroll along the coast! Life is good! Wish you were here! Miss Becca, Mr. Ed (get it…haha!), Miss Rachel and Miss Sally Jan. 8 Our accommodations are very nice, especially by Belize standards — where most families live in space about the size of a residence hall room. The Abby House where we are staying was just dedicated in November. It is named for a visiting resident (physician) Abigail Drake Brinkman. She died in 2005 while she was in Belize. Abby was a fourth-year medical student. Her family raised the money to build the facility. The house has eight bedrooms, four toilets and four showers. It has a large communal kitchen where we have cooked most of our meals. We are currently sharing the Abby House with four visiting medical students, a pharmacy student, a physician assistant and another physical therapist. UW-Madison will be sending a pharmacy student to the Hillside Clinic in February. The current pharmacy student is from Drake University and has started creating a log of all the pharmaceuticals in the clinic so the next pharmacy student will have a solid bank of information for the future. Today was the first open clinic. Local residents began waiting in line to be seen around 7 a.m. The clinic opens at 8 a.m. Many people have to ride a bus for two or more hours to be seen by a medical practitioner. More than 35 people were seen in the morning alone! I will send some photos of local homes and the Hillside Clinic and the Abby House to demonstrate the differences. It feels like there is so much that could be done here. There are big things — like improving the hospital and implementing a better sewer system or a more structured system for education. And there are small things — like getting maps for teachers to use when teaching. It brings into focus very clearly the privilege and plenty I take for granted in the U.S. It begins to get overwhelming — where do you start? The wonder on this trip has definitely been the children. Wherever you go, children bring people together. It could be parents caring about their children or local teachers desperately wanting resources to better educate the children. But the children do not know the difference. They move through their days laughing and smiling as children do everywhere. There is a quote that is one of my favorites: “Children are the future, teach them wisely.” That is a powerful truth here. Lori Jan. 7 Yesterday (Jan. 6) we went to St. Bernadette’s Roman Catholic School. It is located in a small village outside Punta Gorda (in southern Belize). The UW-Madison students met with one class and introduced the topic of disabilities. The grade-school students were given the opportunity to try operating a wheelchair, walking with crutches and leg splints. They were also read a story about living with disabilities, and a video was shown depicting a young man from Ghana who was disabled. The teachers were so open and appreciative of our efforts, as were the children. This is a community with very few financial resources. We are visiting four schools while we are here. The teachers have so little to work with in terms of maps or charts. Most have created maps on fabric and diagram charts on paper to illustrate parts of the body or different countries. Some children with disabilities have been integrated into the classroom, but the teachers have very little specific training for many of the conditions they see. Last night, the students offered a program on autism to the community. Most in attendance had a child with autism. Again — the community is eager to learn and engage in any way to assist their sons or daughters. Today it is 95 degrees, although they say it feels like 115! Will try to have the students write more about their home visits tonight! Lori <div id="story_image_1029" class="inline-content photo span" style="width: 550px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1029/Belize09080.jpg" alt=" " /> A student at St. Bernadette’s Roman Catholic School in Belize, where UW students and faculty visited on Jan. 6 to talk about people with disabilities. </div> Jan. 5, 2009 We arrived in Punta Gorda, Belize, via a three-hour van ride over mountainous roads and single-lane bridges. The plan is to work with the <a href="http://hillsidebelize.org/main.html">Hillside Clinic</a> to offer physical therapy and educational sessions to benefit the entire community. Our first day consisted of a tour of the only hospital and the local medical clinic. It was an eye-opening experience. The hospital was run down and primitive by American standards. It was separated into small, one-room wards, including men’s, women’s, maternity and pediatric. Each ward included approximately eight beds. There was also a fairly recent emergency unit addition. The only ward housing patients was the maternity ward. Some beds didn’t include mattresses; tiles were missing from the ceiling; and floor tiles were cracked and loose. The only way to the second floor and all of the wards was a steep cement ramp. Evaluative capabilities included plain films, lab work and ultrasound. Care between the hospital and clinic is closely tied with one pharmacy to serve both. If more advanced health care is necessary, patients are taken by ambulance to the nearest hospital two hours away. Air transportation surprisingly takes longer than by land. The health care system is very complicated, and our guide stated that most Belizean people do not understand how it works. The National Health Insurance (NHI) program was started to increase the quality of service to patients. There are four available clinics in the Toledo district, and if patients need services, they must attend the clinic in their zone. If patients go to a clinic not in their zone, they will be seen last or not at all. This is due to the fact that reimbursement is only given for patients seen in the correct zone. Things not covered in the NHI program are hospital services without a previous referral; home care and rehabilitation; counseling, drug and alcohol abuse treatment; dialysis; hip replacements/prosthesis; dental care; MRI; or emergency transportation. After our tour, we stopped by the local market to buy veggies, potatoes, fruit and chicken. Although everything is very fresh, you never know quite what you are going to get. For example, some nice greens were accompanied by an army of ants. Needless to say, we did not indulge in the ants. We’re sure we will have more stories to share in the days to come! Farewell from Belize, Becca, Ed, Rachel and Sally <div id="story_image_1025" class="inline-content photo span" style="width: 550px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/1025/Belize09031.jpg" alt=" " /> Participants on the Belize service-learning trip. </div> As part of her semester break, Dean of Students Lori Berquam has accompanied three UW-Madison faculty members and four students on a two-week service-learning trip to Punta Gorda, Belize. The Wisconsin Experience in Motion: Physical Therapy in Belize 16111 2009-01-18T10:38:00-06:00

As part of her semester break, <a href="http://www.wisc.edu/students/">Dean of Students</a> Lori Berquam has accompanied three UW-Madison faculty members and four students on a two-week service-learning trip to Punta Gorda, Belize. <a href="http://www.news.wisc.edu/16115">Read more »</a>

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left School children in Belize with UW student Rachel Wise.

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One of the failings of university learning is that the work of students is often left on the shelf. Assignments, though faithfully completed, rarely make it out of the theoretical. So imagine the thrill for Curt Staats, a senior majoring in <a href="http://www.la.wisc.edu/">landscape architecture</a>, to stand in a remote Honduran village and see one of his school projects come alive in grass, sand and stone. Under the direction of UW-Madison landscape architecture professor <a href="http://www.la.wisc.edu/people/faculty.htm#samdennis">Sam Dennis</a>, Staats designed a children's playground for the townspeople of Orica, a small village in central Honduras where his church has done service work. Last winter, he and Dennis led a group of UW-Madison students and community volunteers to the Central American country to begin building the playground, and now they're headed back. The group of 25, including seven landscape architecture students, will depart Madison on Monday, Jan. 5, for the two-week service-learning trip. "This is really the first big project I've worked on," says Staats, a former woodworker who returned to school to study landscape design. "It's pretty exciting to see it come together." The playground grew from a collaboration between Staats' church, Blackhawk Church of Verona, and a church in Orica. After hearing Orica's mayor describe the need for a place for children to play, Staats volunteered to lay out plans for a playground and park on a triangular patch of city land. To create a design for the park, Staats took lessons from Dennis' work on children's play areas, which rely on natural features such as trails and plantings to stimulate creative play. He also drew inspiration from pictures drawn by children in Orica, who were asked to imagine what their future playground might look like. He then raised money to buy play structures and equipment, which has slowly been making its way to Honduras. In Honduras, students are working side-by-side with local laborers to make that design a reality. On this trip, the group will plant gardens, pour cement for a central plaza and haul sand from a nearby river to fill sandboxes. The experience of sharing labor on a project proves as educational as any lesson on design principles, says Dennis. "We're carrying blocks or digging a trench together, and that becomes a way for us to have something in common," he says. "It's a true partnership that continues to deepen over time." The playground is one of two projects slated for the trip. Students will also spend several days in the highland city of Siguatepeque, which was the focus of Dennis' recent open-space planning and design course. The group will build new trails in a central city park as part of a plan to help protect the environmental integrity of the heavily used natural area. Staats is hopeful that the week of work in Orica will be enough to finish the children's playground. But even if the students can't complete everything, he knows the space won't sit empty. "The last time we were there, we went back to the park one evening and the kids were already using it," he says. "That's the most inspiring part — to see people catch the vision of what we're trying to do." One of the failings of university learning is that the work of students is often left on the shelf. Assignments, though faithfully completed, rarely make it out of the theoretical. Student’s vision comes to life in Honduras 16102 2008-12-29T10:05:00-06:00

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Can one person change the world? The <a href="http://www.lssaa.wisc.edu/kecip">Kauffman Entrepreneurial Community Internship Program</a> (<abbr title="Kauffman Entrepreneurial Community Internship Program">KECIP</abbr>) allows both grads and undergrads an opportunity to utilize skills and knowledge gained in the classroom to become catalysts for social change -- and to get paid for doing it. The program is part of the <a href="http://www.wiscontrepreneurship.org/">Wiscontrepreneur Initiative</a>, made possible in part by a grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation and administered by the UW-Madison <a href="http://www.ocr.wisc.edu/">Office of Corporate Relations</a> and the <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/">Morgridge Center for Public Servic</a>e. In 2008, four KECIP proposals were funded, each aiming to build strong student-community relationships and establish a legacy of local change. "In both my personal and professional life I feel a strong need to give back to my community," said program recipient Amy Hilgendorf, a graduate student in the School of Human Ecology, who was a member of a group project in which recipients researched the effectiveness of programs provided through the Kennedy Heights Community Center. "KECIP was a wonderful opportunity to do this in a new capacity." Nationally there is a growing trend towards university programs that encourage students to become social entrepreneurs who create innovative solutions to pressing societal problems. Over 30 colleges and universities have implemented similar programs in recent years, according to an October 2008 report by the Washington Post. "Entrepreneurship is not just about creating profit. It's also about creating social value," said Assistant Dean Benjamin Rodriguez, one of the principal advisors for KECIP. "It is very exciting that Wisconsin students have a chance to be a part of this movement, especially in our rural/urban Wisconsin communities." "This has gone beyond just our semester-long student project," expressed Catherine Phan, representative of a group of KECIP participants who worked with the Red Cliff Indian Reservation tribal library in Ashland, WI that was in danger of being closed. "We've recruited new students to carry on with the next stage in the development of the library, and have established a committed, long-term partnership between the UW Madison School of Library Studies and the Red Cliff community." According to Louise Robbins, chair of Library and Information Sciences at UW-Madison, the learning outcomes of the project have been tremendous for both the school and students themselves. "They have developed and demonstrated their leadership as well as their knowledge and appreciation for the Red Cliff community and their sense of project management," said Robbins, pointing out that the impact of the project to the Red Cliff community will involve the presentation of the needs assessment and evaluation project to the tribal council. Additional KECIP efforts include a Spanish-English dual-immersion summer language camp and a listening project for Wisconsin grassroots organizations working for social justice and self-determination. KECIP internships vary in length and may begin as early as spring semester 2009. Students accepted in the program will receive a stipend ranging from $2,000 to $5,000 depending on the length of their internship. Groups of five or fewer students will receive up to $6,500 for their project. The sponsoring community organization will be awarded a $1,000 stipend to offset program implementation costs. Interested students need to submit their project proposals to the Morgridge Center by Friday, Dec. 5, for the first application period or Friday, April 28, 2009, for the 2009-2010 academic year. Students may choose KECIP projects in Dane, Ashland or Milwaukee counties. Can one person change the world? The Kauffman Entrepreneurial Community Internship Program (KECIP) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison allows both grads and undergrads an opportunity to utilize skills and knowledge gained in the classroom to become catalysts for social change -- and to get paid for doing it. New program encourages students to become social entrepreneurs 16008 2008-11-26T15:30:00-06:00

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<a href="http://www.news.wisc.edu/keywords/Service%20learning">Service-learning</a> courses bridge the gap between academia and the “real world” by providing students an opportunity to work at locations within the Madison community where their experiences relate to course material. <div id="story_quote_w9XiIjnkNH" class="inline-content pull_quote right"> “Service learning allows students to ... see a different side of the place where they live and meet community members that they wouldn’t otherwise.” <abbr class="initialism" title="University of Wisconsin">UW</abbr>–Madison senior Emily Christian </div> In most service-learning courses, students are required to complete between 15 and 25 hours of service per semester. Students usually go to their service sites one or two times a week for a few hours at a time. Depending on the course they’re taking and the host department, students can find themselves sent anywhere from policy advocacy organizations to publicly financed housing. “The key component to a service-learning course is that you use course ideas as a way to understand your experiences at your placement site,” says <a href="http://polyglot.lss.wisc.edu/aas/faculty/profiles/thornton2.htm">Michael Thornton</a>, faculty director of the <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/">Morgridge Center</a> and professor of an Afro-American studies course. Students are encouraged to connect what they learn in the classroom to their on-site experience by reflecting either via journaling or class discussions. “Our job in the class is to ask ourselves: ‘Does this correspond with our real-world experiences, what we’re seeing here? How does this help us understand what’s going on in the community?’” says <a href="http://www.polisci.wisc.edu/users/Kwalsh/">Katherine Cramer Walsh</a>, a political science professor who teaches a service-learning course in the department. In fact, Randy Wallar, associate director of the Morgridge Center, says studies have shown that connecting academic material with real-world experience helps students learn and retain information much better than learning solely out of books and in the classroom setting. Wallar adds that it has also been proven to reduce stereotyping, so “evidence is that it’s a good methodology of multicultural education,” he says. Students typically complete their service independently, although two or three students from each class are often assigned to the same site. However, some courses incorporate group service work. Because many service sites are located off campus, the Morgridge Center has contracted Union Cab to drive students between their service sites and the Armory and Gymnasium for no cost. “That’s just one way we wanted to help get students out beyond their bubble and into areas that really need assistance,” Wallar says. <abbr class="initialism" title="University of Wisconsin">UW</abbr>–Madison senior Emily Christian, who took the course <a href="http://www.education.wisc.edu/RPSE/_uploads/300_lect2_Fall08.pdf">Rehabilitation Psychology and Special Education 300 (Individuals with Disabilities)</a> her freshman year, enjoyed seeing more of Madison than just campus. “Being able to go out in the community as a freshman really gave me a different perspective on where I lived,” she says. “I think that’s what a lot of students find is that they’re living in this town, they’re living in this community that is very campus-oriented. And service learning allows students to kind of leave that community or see a different side of the place where they live and meet community members that they wouldn’t otherwise.” During her service-learning experience, Christian worked with the <a href="http://www.madison.com/communities/smce/">South Madison Coalition of the Elderly</a>, an organization promoting the independence of the elderly and disabled. Thornton agrees that one of the most beneficial aspects of service learning is getting students out of the exclusive campus environment. “Ultimately, for the students who get the most out of the class, they’re given some kind of meaning to their life because they can see something that’s larger than them that they can have some kind of influence or impact on,” he says. “What they learn is that they have more power than they think they do.” Christian, who is majoring in international studies and sociology, is now a service-learning fellow. Her job is to enhance the communication among service-learning sites, professors and students. <abbr class="initialism" title="University of Wisconsin">UW</abbr>–Madison senior and service-learning fellow Sarah Parker is majoring in social work. Last fall she took a course on homelessness, Social Work 578. She did her service work at the <a href="http://www.neighborhoodhousemadison.org/">Neighborhood House</a>, a Madison nonprofit organization endeavoring to serve any needs that may arise. Parker revamped their food pantry program to serve more people. Parker says one of the most important things she learned during her service learning was “the reality of working with not-for-profit groups and agencies and how scattered everything can be, and how things truly are understaffed and underpaid. They have way too much that they are expected to do every week and just understanding that they’re doing the best they can.” But not all service learning is local. Andrea “Tess” Arenas takes service learning outside of Madison every summer. For her course Environmental Studies 402, Crossing Borders: Environmental Justice at the <abbr class="initialism" title="United States">U.S.</abbr>/Mexico Border, Arenas takes her students to the Mexican border between May and June. Students spend half of the course living in Brownsville, Texas, and the other in Matamoros, Mexico. The 30 hours of required service learning for this course is spent on education and improving the local environment with initiatives including cleaning up neighborhoods, door-to-door education campaigns on harmful toxins, garbage recycling projects, setting up health screenings and teaching residents to recycle and not burn garbage. “Because they are two different cities, [students] understand the border dynamics and the environmental justice issues from both perspectives,” Arenas says. “The students, through these service-learning experiences, had a much better understanding of global dynamics, the influence of multinational corporations and the enforcement or lack of enforcement of environmental laws in the United States and Mexico.” Arenas won the Creative and Innovative Program Award of Merit for a Credit Program for the course in 2006 from the <a href="http://www.naass.org/">North American Association of Summer Sessions</a>. While statistics have shown that service-learning courses are highly popular among students — none of the 74 service-learning students in a spring 2008 <abbr class="initialism" title="University of Wisconsin">UW</abbr>–Madison survey were unsure or disagreed that their service-learning experience was favorable — the university still has trouble getting staff on board to create more courses. Both Thornton and Arenas hypothesize that some faculty are reluctant to get involved because of the extra work required. “[When you teach out of books], you don’t have to really stretch your own thinking about the world,” Thornton says. “Service-learning courses require that you take your ideas and apply them to real life. That becomes muddied, that becomes complicated. Then you have to spend time telling the students what that means.” Arenas points out that there are grant programs and resources available through her office in the College of Letters and Science to help faculty launch new service-learning courses, including a special-needs grant for up to $650 and a planning grant for up to $2,000. Thornton adds that he hopes to get more students of color and more male students involved in service-learning courses. “We need to use these resources on campus to make this world a better place and in the process, educate our students in a way that when they go out in the real world and become leaders and managers, they have some experience to base that off of,” he says. “A lot of students find that when they take service learning, they’re more marketable as well because they’ve dealt with the real world.” Service-learning courses bridge the gap between academia and the “real world” by providing students an opportunity to work at locations within the Madison community where their experiences relate to course material. Service-learning courses reveal real-world issues 15741 2008-10-09T00:00:00-05:00

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Watch a WISC-TV <cite>For the Record</cite> episode that features UW-Madison’s Engineers Without Borders program. http://www.c3ktogo.com/news-video/?mgid=17095 Engineers Without Borders 15398 2008-07-17T00:00:00-05:00

The mention of Eurasian water-milfoil and zebra mussels in <a href="http://www.journalism.wisc.edu/faculty/brossardbio.html">Dominique Brossard</a>'s strategic communication class last February had students rolling their eyes and swapping puzzled looks. But after a semester of carefully tailoring multimedia campaigns to help a Wisconsin non-profit group get the word out about lake preservation, that initial bewilderment was replaced by an enthusiasm that could help keep state lakes free of invasive species. <div id="story_image_609" class="inline-content photo right" style="width: 240px"> <img class="noBorder" src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/0609/J345Ad.jpg" alt="Print ad from one of the project team’s proposals" /> Teams of students in Dominque Brossard’s strategic communication class prepared public awareness campaigns aimed at educating citizens about the threat of invasive species in Wisconsin’s lakes. This print ad is built around the slogan, "Wisconsin’s Been Good to You. Return the Favor." </div> "My family owns a cabin on a lake and when I learned more about these aquatic invasive species, I felt that this has to stop. This was a local project. It gave us more of a drive to make it great and have an impact," says Jared Davis, a senior from Wisconsin Rapids. Brossard's class, in the <a href="http://www.journalism.wisc.edu/">School of Journalism and Mass Communication</a>, was helped by a grant from the University of Wisconsin-Madison's <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/">Morgridge Center for Public Service</a>, which she wrote along with UW Extension professor <a href="http://lsc.wisc.edu/index.php/faculty-staff/faculty/bret-shaw">Bret Shaw</a>. Students tackled a service learning project aimed at building awareness for the state's <a href="http://www.uwsp.edu/cnr/uwexlakes/CBCW">Clean Boats, Clean Waters</a> mission. The group informs Wisconsin boaters about aquatic invasive species and encourages them to inspect and wash their boats after each use so they don't transport invasive species from lake to lake. In the past, the class had worked with high-profile Midwestern companies, such as Schwinn. But those projects didn't always resonate like the Clean Boats, Clean Waters campaign. <div id="story_quote_“Alotoft" class="inline-content pull-quote left"> “A lot of the current messages are too informational for the normal person to care. We’re trying to move toward a more emotional stance to get people more involved. A lot of our ads are hitting on the emotional attachment people have to Wisconsin.” Matthew Wisniewski, a junior from Sun Prairie </div> "It was kind of a good surprise to work on something so local. With Clean Boats, Clean Waters, you can see how you can make a difference," says Katie Mioni, a junior from Rockford, Ill. Brossard divided her class into six project teams of about five students each and each devised a multimedia campaign to raise awareness of the problem and encourage behavior change. Last week, the teams made their final, 12-minute presentation to leaders of Clean Boats, Clean Waters and UW Extension. "I'm just blown away. They all looked so professional," says Erin Henegar, volunteer coordinator for Clean Boats, Clean Waters, which is based at UW-Stevens Point. "I'm totally amazed. In every single one of them, there is something we can use. They did a ton of work for us, so we can pick and choose." The campaigns were designed with a hypothetical $200,000 budget and involved everything from print and radio ads to advertisements on social networking sites such as Facebook and viral videos. Students also came up with promotional events such as fishing clinics for kids, fish cooking contests and giveaways of bucket and boat-cleaning sponges in the shape of the state. They built the campaigns based on actual survey and focus group research conducted with groups of lake users. Brossard says the ability to see their work put into practice provided some extra incentive for her students. "It was very motivational to have a project that was so local, and the quality of their work and their creativity were great," says Brossard. One of the groups, Stream Line Media, also drew some inspiration from this spring's retirement of Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre. It underscored for the group how attached Wisconsinites are to their state and its traditions. They built their campaign around the slogan, "Wisconsin's Been Good to You. Return the Favor." "A lot of the current messages are too informational for the normal person to care. We're trying to move toward a more emotional stance to get people more involved," says Matthew Wisniewski, a junior from Sun Prairie. "A lot of our ads are hitting on the emotional attachment people have to Wisconsin." Slogans for some of the other campaigns included "Preservation for the Future Generation," "Locals Only: Keep Invasive Species Out," "Are Aquatic Hitchhikers Ruining Your Experience at the Lake?" and a campaign using wild West wanted posters that ask "Are You Harboring This Criminal?" Another group used graphic depictions of people swimming and water skiing through weed-clogged lakes and asked: "Is This What You Had in Mind?" Brossard says she hopes to get students involved in more of these service learning projects that reach out to the state in the tradition of the Wisconsin Idea — that the boundaries of the campus are the boundaries of the state, and beyond. The mention of Eurasian water-milfoil and zebra mussels in Dominique Brossard's strategic communication class last February had students rolling their eyes and swapping puzzled looks. But after a semester of carefully tailoring multimedia campaigns to help a Wisconsin non-profit group get the word out about lake preservation, that initial bewilderment was replaced by an enthusiasm that could help keep state lakes free of invasive species. Class works to protect Wisconsin lakes in service learning project 15229 2008-05-13T00:00:00-05:00

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In the process of applying for grants to conduct his own environmental research, Craig Kohn was asked to take the lead on implementing an environmental education program through the <a href="http://www.wisconsinffafoundation.org">Wisconsin Future Farmers of America (FFA) Association</a>. <div id="story_quote_Inaddition" class="inline-content pull-quote right"> In addition to a hectic schedule of student teaching and program-coordinating, Craig Kohn spends 10 to 20 hours per week as one of UW-Madison’s Bucky Badger mascots. </div> Unenthusiastic at first, Kohn soon discovered his passion for education. "The initial disappointment of having to drop the research project was outweighed by how much I enjoy teaching," says Kohn. "I felt that my work would be more beneficial if I could create future ecological researchers rather than continue my own research." Kohn assumed full control of the program and conducted Wisconsin's first-ever Environmental and Natural Resources State Competition, held at the Alliant Energy Center during the Wisconsin State FFA Convention. He also conducted educational workshops and sought contributions and ideas from the state's agricultural instructors and UW-Madison students and faculty. "At the competition, we try to incorporate things like soil science, water quality, air quality, wildlife identification and so on. It's a test of high school students' knowledge but also shows that they really care about the environment," says Kohn. Kohn continues to ensure the program reflects ideas of sustainable use, and his success can be measured by recognition from the Wisconsin Legislature, the University of Wisconsin System and multiple agricultural agencies. He will graduate with degrees in both agricultural and educational science as well as acquiring two teaching certificates. In addition to a hectic schedule of student teaching and program-coordinating, Kohn spends 10 to 20 hours per week as one of UW-Madison's Bucky Badger mascots. After completing his program in six years, which is typically finished in seven, Kohn plans on residing in the Madison area and continuing his work with the FFA. In the process of applying for grants to conduct his own environmental research, Craig Kohn was asked to take the lead on implementing an environmental education program through the Wisconsin Future Farmers of America (FFA) Association. Unenthusiastic at first, Kohn soon discovered his passion for education. Notable graduates: Craig Kohn — A passion for agricultural education 15234 2008-05-13T00:00:00-05:00

As 255 UW-Madison students and community members thundered down the Lakeshore Path on the first warm Saturday morning in April, they dodged muddy puddles and happy pedestrians out for a weekend walk along Lake Mendota. The runners' motivation? A worthy cause and several hundred slices of pie waiting at the finish line. April 5 was the eighth annual Pi Mile Run, hosted by the UW-Madison chapter of <a href="http://www.engr.wisc.edu/studentorgs/tbp/">Tau Beta Pi</a>, an engineering honor society. This year boasted double the attendance of last year's event, with participants running in either a 5k (3.14 miles) or 10k race. All race proceeds go toward a clean water project in El Salvador. Mechanical engineering student Ted Durkee, who coordinated the 2007 run, connected the honor society with the El Salvador project. Two summers ago, Durkee traveled to El Salvador to work with ENLACE, a nonprofit organization that develops sustainable initiatives in El Salvador. Currently, families in the communities of Las Delicias, Las Animas and El Rosario spend a third of their meager income trucking in water — yet, the water comes from one of the most polluted rivers in El Salvador. During his stay in El Salvador, Durkee learned that community residents have been trying to get clean water for more than 50 years. The three communities, which combined have a population of 6,100, now are working together on their attempts to build a well water system. They finally developed formal plans in 2002. Although the communities have the will to implement the project and ENLACE provides organizational support, they lack the finances to get the wells and pipes in place. Biomedical engineering student Jessica Hause organized the 2008 Pi Mile Run, with help from Durkee and biomedical engineering student Sarah Steenblock. As in 2007, they again chose the Las Delicias water project as the charity to benefit from race sponsors and registration fees. "We volunteered for this because we were really excited about the opportunity to organize a community event and help fulfill a need that will directly change people's lives," Durkee says. The strong turnout means Tau Beta Pi will donate about $4,000 — an amount that will make a significant difference. Every $20 equals 8 feet of pipe for the well system, according to Hause. A variety of sponsors, including URS Washington Division; Graef, Anhalt, Schloemer and Associates Inc.; Polygon Engineering Council; Saris Cycling Group; Rudolph & Sletten Inc; Underground Printing; Fontana Sports; Montgomery Associates; and Hey and Associates Inc., also helped make the Pi Mile Run a success, says Durkee. "We were really excited and pleasantly surprised by the generosity of our sponsors this year. That definitely had a tremendous effect on the event and enabled us to make a much bigger impact on our chosen charity," he says. As 255 University of Wisconsin-Madison students and community members thundered down the Lakeshore Path on the first warm Saturday morning in April, they dodged muddy puddles and happy pedestrians out for a weekend walk along Lake Mendota. Pi Mile Run benefits well water project in El Salvador 15058 2008-04-10T00:00:00-05:00

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New Year's Eve in Nejapa, El Salvador, looks a lot like the Fourth of July. At Griselda Guzman's house, homemade fireworks lighted the front yard, where the guests dancing outside her pale yellow home included 11 University of Wisconsin-Madison engineering students and three advisers. <div id="story_image_497" class="inline-content photo right" style="width: 270px"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/story_images/0000/0497/el-salvador.jpg" alt="Photo of people working on wastewater system" /> Students from the UW-Madison chapter of Engineers Without Borders spent their winter break in El Salvador to begin construction on a gravity-based wastewater system that will link two nearby communities to the sewer system in the larger city of Nejapa. </div> That first night of celebration launched three weeks of local hospitality toward the students, who are members of the UW-Madison chapter of <a href="http://www.ewbuw.org/">Engineers Without Borders</a> (EWB). The group spent its winter break in El Salvador to begin construction on a mostly gravity-based wastewater system that will link two nearby communities to the sewer system in the larger city of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nejapa">Nejapa</a>. Community members from the two small towns of La Granja and Nuevo Ferrocarril approached Rotary International for help in 2005. A contact then turned to the UW-Madison chapter of EWB, a nonprofit organization that partners with communities in the United States and developing countries to undertake sustainable engineering projects. In El Salvador, residents worked alongside the UW-Madison students digging trenches, laying pipe and packing soil to cover the pipe. Community leaders, schoolchildren and even a grandmother toiled in the heat every day with the EWB volunteers. "This whole project is for the community-they asked for it, they know they need it, and we were there to help them," says EWB member Leah Kammel, a natural resources and environmental engineering student. La Granja is home to 850 El Salvadorans, while Nuevo Ferrocarril has 1,500 residents. The homes, which are pieced together with wood, metal and other materials, only recently received running water. However, for co-project managers and civil and environmental engineering students Jonathan Blanchard and Kevin Orner, seeing life in El Salvador made them reexamine what they define as poverty. "There are ways that Americans are 'poorer' than my El Salvadoran friends," says Blanchard. "There's a real sense of community in La Granja and Nuevo Ferrocarril, and a real sense that everyone is connected. So there's a pervading atmosphere of respect, and a willingness to serve selflessly and lend a hand at the drop of a hat." The trip also served as a test of leadership. Upon arriving in El Salvador, the team learned its original design didn't quite match local building codes and that it would be impossible to dig the trenches merely with shovels in soil Blanchard describes as hard, compact, tropical clay. Blanchard says the golden rule in a project like this is always to be flexible. After the first few days, the team was ready with a design that did meet code. The students also brought in a backhoe-and the results were a success: The group laid 500 meters of pipe, built five manholes and compacted-by hand-500 cubic meters of soil. During their trip to El Salvador, EWB members also gave presentations to schoolchildren about sanitary habits and taught local community members how to set up hand-washing stations. Additionally, they took water samples that will be analyzed at the Wisconsin State Health Laboratory of Hygiene to further help community members identify and treat wastewater pathogens. Ultimately, the wastewater system will stretch approximately 6,700 meters to connect to Nejapa, and UW-Madison EWB members plan to return to El Salvador to help community members as they take over the construction process. For the students, the trip was an opportunity to blend their technical skills and humanitarian interests. "It was amazing to be able to use our engineering skills and actually make a difference and help people," says Kammel. New Year's Eve in Nejapa, El Salvador, looks a lot like the Fourth of July. At Griselda Guzman's house, homemade fireworks lighted the front yard, where the guests dancing outside her pale yellow home included 11 University of Wisconsin-Madison engineering students and three advisers. UW students help El Salvadoran towns build wastewater system 14827 2008-02-27T00:00:00-06:00

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The University of Wisconsin-Madison was named this week to the 2007 <a href="http://www.nationalservice.gov/honorroll">President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll</a> With Distinction for its efforts to promote community service and service learning on its campus. Only six schools received a higher award — the Presidential Award for Exemplary Community Service — with 126 additional schools named to the Honor Roll With Distinction and another 391 to the Honor Roll. "Americans rely on our higher education system to prepare students for citizenship and the workforce," says U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings. "We look to institutions like these to provide leadership in partnering with local schools to shape the civic, democratic and economic future of our country." The honor roll began last year as a joint project of the Corporation for National and Community Service, the U.S. Department of Education, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, USA Freedom Corps, Campus Compact and the President's Council on Service and Civic Participation. The program is meant to create incentives for increased volunteering at the collegiate level. Schools apply for the honor and are judged based on the scope and innovation of their service projects, the percentage of student participation in service activities, incentives for service, and the extent to which the school offers service-learning courses. UW-Madison currently offers more than 50 service-learning courses through the continually expanding <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/">Morgridge Center for Public Service</a>. The center, as well as many campus fraternities, sororities and student organizations, promotes volunteering and community service. The University of Wisconsin-Madison was named this week to the 2007 President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll With Distinction for its efforts to promote community service and service learning on its campus. UW-Madison makes presidential honor roll for community service 14760 2008-02-13T00:00:00-06:00

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Four <a href="http://www.wisconsin.edu/">University of Wisconsin System</a> students, including two from UW-Madison, will receive this year's <a href="http://www.alliantenergy.com/docs/groups/public/documents/pub/default.hcsp">Alliant Energy</a>/<a href="http://www.usg.edu/chancellor/bio/">Erroll B. Davis Jr.</a> Achievement Awards, recognizing outstanding scholarship and community service. Here are the 2008 winners: <ul> <li>Tyrus S. Cartwright of UW-Madison is a first-generation college student who is expected to graduate with a Bachelor of Science degree in December '08. His community service includes membership in the National Society of Black Engineers and the Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity.</li> <li>Pachia Lor of UW-Platteville is also a first-generation college student, planning to receive her Bachelor of Science degree in business administration. She currently serves as a commissioner of the Segregated University Fee Allocation Commission and has served as a board member for the Hmong Mutual Assistance Association.</li> <li>Duane G. Mahone received his Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering from UW-Platteville in December. Duane was a member of the Black Student Union, a Resident Assistant, and a member of the school's football team.</li> <li>Kyle S. Munoz is a senior at UW-Madison and expects to receive a Bachelor of Science degree in business administration in May. He has participated in both the Chancellor's Scholarship Program and the Multicultural Business Students Association on campus. </li> </ul> All will be honored Friday at a luncheon from 12:30 — 3:30 p.m. at the Pyle Center in Madison. Award presenters will include UW System President <a href="http://www.uwsa.edu/president/">Kevin P. Reilly</a>, UW System Senior Vice President <a href="http://www.wisconsin.edu/news/2007/r070518.htm">Rebecca Martin</a>, and Alliant Energy Foundation President <a href="http://www.alliantenergy.com/docs/groups/public/documents/pub/p014754.hcsp">Barbara Swan</a>. "These students set high standards for themselves and worked hard to meet and surpass those standards. They are an impressive group, highly motivated, and already very accomplished. The community involvement of these students is an inspiration to all of us who urge our young people to put their talent to use to improve the society they will soon lead," says Reilly. Made possible by the Alliant Energy Foundation, which established a $400,000 endowment fund in 2007, awards are given in honor of former Alliant Energy CEO Erroll B. Davis, who now serves as chancellor for the University of Georgia System. Paying tribute to Davis' legacy, award recipients represent undergraduate students from traditionally underrepresented minority groups who are pursuing degrees in engineering or business, two degrees held by Davis. Recipients must be enrolled at either UW-Madison or <a href="http://www.uwplatt.edu/">UW-Platteville</a>, campuses in regions of the state where Alliant Energy provides energy services. Four University of Wisconsin System students, including two from UW-Madison, will receive this year's Alliant Energy/Erroll B. Davis Jr. Achievement Awards, recognizing outstanding scholarship and community service. 2008 Alliant Energy/Erroll B. Davis Jr. Achievement Award recipients announced 14708 2008-02-06T00:00:00-06:00

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Since 1990, University of Wisconsin-Madison student spring breakers have abandoned the luxury of sandy beaches to travel across the country and volunteer during their precious week of spring break. <a href="http://www.union.wisc.edu/altbreaks/">Alternative Breaks</a>, a program sponsored by the Morgridge Center for Public Service, challenges hundreds of students every year to step outside their comfort zones, pick up a shovel, hammer or kitchen apron and experience hands-on volunteer experiences in environments drastically different from home. This spring break, Alternative Breaks has 12 trips going everywhere from a wet shelter in Boston to the devastation in New Orleans to the Everglades in Florida. The deadline for applying is noon on Friday, Feb. 8.  The program has always been a program organized by students for students. This year's Alternative Breaks director, Maya Oyarbide-Sanchez, a senior majoring in psychology and Chicano/Latino studies, shares her experience with the program and her advice to students considering alternative breaks. Q: When did you first here about alternative breaks? Why did you decide to take the leap and go? A: "A little over a year ago, I was looking for something to do over winter break and stumbled upon the alternative break Web site. To be honest, I was kind of sick of my roommates. I just wanted to do something over break without them that wasn't just sitting around all break. I wanted to do something that had more meaning to it and I could get something out of. So I applied to go on an alt break trip. I went to San Juan, Texas, last winter, and I have gone on two trips since then — to a wet shelter in Boston and to help with hurricane relief in New Orleans." Q: What were you expecting going into the trip? What was the reality? A: "I went into the alt break with the mentality a lot of people have. 'This is going to be so cool. I'm going to volunteer. I'm going to help people.' And then after my trip, a lot of it was more how the trip impacted me. You go down there for a week, sometimes two. You are not actually doing that much work. And sometimes people say, 'I thought I was going to do more work.' But it is actually just about awareness and bringing that back to campus to educate more people. I really didn't expect it to have as much of an effect on me as it did." Q: Who did you meet on the trip and what did you take away? A: "The trips I liked the most were the ones where you got to actually talk to people from the community. When you are talking to someone who tells you what their life is like and what they need and why they are in their situation, that is when you really get to understand more. "This one guy from the Boston wet shelter sticks out in my memory. He was just kind of this crazy 50-year-old guy who would come in with a Batman mask on or Mardi Gras beads and always doing something kind of ridiculous. From the beginning, he always called me his niece and he was my uncle Bruce. Anytime anyone at the shelter would give me a hard time he would say, 'Leave my niece alone.' He just took me under his wing. When I left, he gave me a hug and said, 'You remember if anyone is after you, you tell them Uncle Bruce is coming to get them.' I just started crying. I just didn't expect to get so attached to someone in a week." Q: What is the most common response you get from returning students? A: "Like me, I think a lot of students feel that culture shock. They didn't really expect that the trip would have that much of an effect on them. I think a lot of people just think they are going down there to volunteer and don't think about how much it is going to change their own perspective on things. People come back a lot more affected than they thought they were going to be." Q: Any advice for students thinking of applying? A: "I think a lot of students are hesitant to go with people that they don't know. They want to go with their friends. But for me, it is one of the coolest things to see. You have 10 kids at the beginning of orientation who don't say anything to each other and are afraid to talk to each other. And then they all come back after a week and are hugging and want to hang out. People really make cool friendships out of this. I know I have a lot of friends I made out of my alt breaks. If anyone is hesitating for reasons like that, I would just encourage them to go for it." Since 1990, University of Wisconsin-Madison student spring breakers have abandoned the luxury of sandy beaches to travel across the country and volunteer during their precious week of spring break. Students choose service over sun on alternative breaks 14693 2008-02-05T00:00:00-06:00

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For the second straight year, the University of Wisconsin-Madison is second in the nation in producing alumni volunteers to the <a href="http://www.peacecorps.gov/">Peace Corps</a>. The 2007 ranking continues the <a href="http://www.cals.wisc.edu/IP/peace_corps/index.html">university's strong relationship</a> with the service institution, which included 20 straight years as the Corps' top producer from 1986-2005. The rankings released this week by the Peace Corps show that in the large schools category, the University of Washington ranks first, with 113 undergraduate alumni serving as volunteers. UW-Madison holds second place with 99 undergraduate alumni volunteers, and the University of Colorado at Boulder follows closely behind with 94 volunteers. Alumni of UW-Madison and the Peace Corps continue to have a strong historical bond. Since Peace Corps' inception, 2,812 alumni of UW-Madison have joined the ranks, making it the second leading producer of volunteers of all time, says Greg Pepping, Peace Corps representative for UW-Madison. "This is an awesome campus for generating Peace Corps volunteers. The community at UW-Madison offers an environment that produces alumni who really care about people. Because Madison alumni care, they make great volunteers. We can be proud of that," Pepping says. One of the many distinguishing features about UW-Madison is its Master's International Program, offered by six UW departments, that helps volunteers earn advance degrees for their time and experiences in the Peace Corps. "Every day I'm impressed with the commitment UW-Madison students have to make a difference in the world. Every day I talk to students excited about serving overseas in Peace Corps," Pepping says. Schools are ranked according to the size of the student body. Small schools are those with less than 5,000 undergraduates, medium-sized schools have between 5,001 to 15,000 undergraduates, and large schools more than 15,000 undergraduates. Although it is not a requirement for service, the majority of volunteers who have served in the Peace Corps since its founding 46 years ago have been college graduates. Currently, 95 percent of volunteers have at least an undergraduate degree, with 11 percent of those also possessing a graduate-level degree. The Peace Corps is celebrating a 46-year legacy of service at home and abroad. Currently there are more than 8,000 volunteers abroad, a 37-year high for volunteers in the field. Since 1961, more than 190,000 volunteers have helped promote a better understanding between Americans and the people of the 139 countries where volunteers have served. Peace Corps service is a 27-month commitment. For the second straight year, the University of Wisconsin-Madison is second in the nation in producing alumni volunteers to the Peace Corps. UW-Madison No. 2 in producing Peace Corps volunteers 14610 2008-01-15T00:00:00-06:00

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After more than 40 hours of traveling, 30 University of Wisconsin-Madison students arrived last week in Cape Town, South Africa to start a two-week adventure in South Africa's capital city that will include a leadership seminar and service projects. The engineering and genetics students are paired with 30 University of Cape Town students for the <a href="http://studentservices.engr.wisc.edu/leadershape/home.htm">2008 Leadershape Institute</a>, a national leadership program held annually at the UW-Madison <a href="http://www.engr.wisc.edu/">College of Engineering</a>. Though international students have come to the United States to participate in the program, this is the first time U.S. students have traveled abroad for Leadershape. This year also marks the first time the Leadershape seminar will be complemented with service projects to help students put their skills to use. Student writer and participant Sandra Knisely is providing <a href="http://www.engr.wisc.edu/news/headlines/2008/Jan03.html">regular updates</a> on the experience.  The trip began bright and early on New Year's Day, and immediately became an exercise in leadership as a great deal of logistical skill was needed to get 30 students, as well as two faculty advisers and their spouses, all in the right place at the right time for the flights. Junior genetics student Meg Holler and civil engineering junior Rebecca Gilsdorf are, as student coordinators, responsible for keeping track of everyone. Main coordinator Kathy Prem from the Office of Engineering Career Services traveled ahead of the group to Cape Town, so Holler and Gilsdorf had to tackle the complications that come with taking a group to an entirely different continent. What's most important for those coordinating a group traveling internationally? Cell phones, says Holler, and plenty of patience. A couple of logistical hiccups did come up that tested their resourcefulness. One student missed the 5 a.m. bus from Madison to Chicago's O'Hare airport. Luckily, the student made it to the airport via cab. Later in the trip, two students missed the final flight from Johannesburg, South Africa to Cape Town, and Holler and Gilsdorf had to sort through the situation and track down the students. Everything was just fine after the students were put on a later flight and arrived in Cape Town shortly after the rest of the group. Otherwise, the trip went smoothly, and the greatest hassles involved broken remote controls for the personal TV screens on the 14-hour flight from Washington, D.C. to Johannesburg. The other issues were common to any long distance traveler: fatigue and boredom. But when the South African airliner cruised over Namibia around 8 a.m. Wisconsin time, the students who weren't asleep got a fresh dose of enthusiasm for the trip. Another rush of adrenaline swept the cabin after the massive urban sprawl of Johannesburg appeared out of the reddish, vacant South African landscape. That boost proved crucial for students as they navigated the busy, perplexing layout of the Johannesburg airport. The first thing everyone noticed about Africa as they stepped off the plane was the heat; Johannesburg boasted 102 degrees Fahrenheit on January 2, and the stuffiness of the airport did little to help the group during their final layover. After some initial delay, the last flight went quickly and the group descended into the endless yellow lights of Cape Town about 9 p.m. local time (1 p.m. Wisconsin time). Industrial engineering senior Matt Kopetsky says the sight of Cape Town was exciting. "This trip is going to be amazing," he says. "I can't wait to see the city." After a 20-minute ride — on the left side of the road — in the bright blue buses that will shuttle the group around in the coming weeks, the group arrived at their final stop: the University of Cape Town (<abbr title="University of Cape Town">UCT</abbr>). UCT is situated at the base of Table Mountain, the 3,566-foot landmark that the group will hike in a couple of days. Its elevated position provides a stellar view of nighttime Cape Town. Each student has an individual room (though many must share very few bathrooms) in the UCT dorm, which is structured in a square around an open courtyard with a massive palm tree in the center. The dorm, dubbed "Harry Potteresque" by Prem, has ivy growing on the walls, tower-like corners and large brick archways. The rooms themselves are warm-toned with wooden floors and furniture, as well as matching tan curtains and bedspreads. In the morning, the students will jump start their trip with a tour of the campus and nearby forest preserve, and the afternoon will be spent in the famous Cape Town waterfront. However, for now the students have fallen into bed, exhausted but successful after traveling half a world away in the last two days. After more than 40 hours of traveling, 30 University of Wisconsin-Madison students arrived last week in Cape Town, South Africa to start a two-week adventure in South Africa's capital city that will include a leadership seminar and service projects. Students take leadership venture to South Africa 14596 2008-01-07T00:00:00-06:00

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Ten University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate students and their advisor will regroup in Madison during the first full week of August after spending the past two months in New Orleans, helping residents of the city's Lower Ninth Ward who hope to revitalize a natural treasure near the neighborhood ravaged by Hurricane Katrina. The students are participants in the <a href="http://www.ies.wisc.edu/">Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies</a>' annual <a href="http://www.nelson.wisc.edu/grad/requirements/wrm/pract_07_no.htm">Water Resources Management Workshop</a>. The Lower Ninth Ward's Holy Cross Neighborhood Association invited them to evaluate the feasibility of restoring Bayou Bienvenue, a former cypress swamp, to mitigate future storm surges and provide other environmental benefits. They also are collaborating with the University of Colorado's landscape architecture department and the Sierra Club on plans for a nature preserve and interpretive center. While in New Orleans, the UW-Madison students gathered data on the history of the bayou, its current ecological conditions, and community attitudes about its proposed restoration. They will analyze the data this fall and present their findings to the neighborhood association by the end of the year. "We have received such a welcoming response," says faculty advisor <a href="http://www.geology.wisc.edu/people/display.html?id=22">Herb Wang</a>, a UW-Madison professor of geology, geophysics, and environmental studies. Funding is being sought for follow-up activities that would involve UW-Madison graduate students for several more years. The Nelson Institute's summer <a href="http://www.nelson.wisc.edu/grad/wrm/workshops.htm">Water Resources Management Workshop</a> creates an opportunity for student teams to work outside the classroom on "real-world" concerns. Previous workshops have addressed more than two-dozen local and regional water management problems across Wisconsin. Last year, the workshop produced a plan to improve the water quality of Monona Bay in central Madison. Ten University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate students and their advisor will regroup in Madison during the first full week of August after spending the past two months in New Orleans, helping residents of the city's Lower Ninth Ward who hope to revitalize a natural treasure near the neighborhood ravaged by Hurricane Katrina. Students aid New Orleans restoration project 13967 2007-07-27T00:00:00-05:00

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Two students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, along with 11 other students and recent graduates from around the country, are going to live on a bus this summer. But the trip is far from a typical college summer road trip, as this bus is the first-ever "green-certified" motor coach and is equipped with full Internet access, computer workstations, video cameras and a media center and is powered by biodiesel fuel. The <a href="http://www.udall.gov/udall.asp?link=603">bus tour</a> is in honor of the 10th anniversary of the <a href="http://www.udall.gov">Morris K. Udall Foundation</a>, an organization established by Congress to honor the legacy of former U.S. Rep. Morris K. Udall, who championed environmental preservation issues, Native American health and tribal public policy. The 13 students, including Julie Curti and Martina Gast, are Udall Scholars, having received merit-based scholarships and fellowships for their study of the environment and Native American policy in the United States. "I am looking forward to seeing what's out there, because I've studied a lot of these issues, I've worked on them, but I'm going to see so much diversity of what environmentalism and sustainability mean," says Curti, a UW-Madison student from Plover, Wis., and a sustainable cities events co-coordinator for the bus tour. The students depart from Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, June 12, after a launch that will feature Congressional speakers from both major political parties. Throughout the bus tour, the students will stop at 32 different places, including cities, colleges and universities, tribal reservations and national parks. The students will participate in 20 public-service projects along the way. As the students travel between stops on the bus tour, they will be writing on a collective blog about their experience, creating video documentaries and coordinating media at future stops. "One of our goals is to make the bus tour carbon-neutral," says Curti. "Of course, we will give off carbon emissions, but through carbon offsetting it is possible. For example, we will be purchasing offsets for the entire tour through Native Energy, a Native American-owned carbon-offset company." One of the projects along the tour will be with Working Bikes in Chicago, a local nonprofit cooperative that diverts waste from landfills by rebuilding and shipping used bicycles to places in need, including the Chicago area, the Gulf Coast, Ghana, Tanzania, Nicaragua and Peru. Another project will be a bioremediation effort in New Orleans, where the group is aiding a project created by a Udall alumni, called Replant New Orleans. "We're going to work with plants that suck toxins out of the soil - it's a more natural way to help heal the earth after the Hurricane Katrina disaster," says Curti. Because the 13 students that organized each stop on the bus tour live around the country, Curti describes the efforts to coordinate the stops as "interesting" so far and is enthusiastic about the possibilities and experiences the group will encounter. "No other tour has tried to tackle so many issues before, so we don't know exactly what is going to happen at the different stops. It'll be exciting to see how it turns out." Gast, a tribal events co-coordinator and the only student on the bus who is Native American, organized several stops at Native American reservations in Ithaca, N.Y.; Grand Ronde, Ore.; Lawrence, Kan.; and Oklahoma City. In Grande Ronde, the local tribe is opening a campground and will have the groundbreaking ceremony in coordination with bus tour so the students can attend and aid the campground in the development of environmentally sustainable practices. "I hope to grow from this internship," says Gast, a junior from Chilton, Wis. "It will provide a good foundation for working with tribal people in the future." Gast intends to pursue federal indigenous law after graduation, because "there aren't many Native people working for the rights of Native people." Curti says that the purpose of the bus tour echoes that sentiment. "The lack of focus on diversity has been an ongoing problem in the environmental movement. And environmental health issues disproportionately affect local minority communities. There's been a movement in the past years to combine these efforts and realize that issues on a national level connect to individual communities. "Too often, with environmental issues, people focus on negatives, like global warming, but this is a tour that really wants to highlight positive efforts that can be made," adds Curti. Gast agrees: "It's rewarding to know that you're a part of the [Udall] Foundation and that you can make a positive difference." And the reason why UW-Madison has the highest number of participants in the tour? Curti believes that "it could have something to do with the fact that we go to an institution in such a progressive state that has a great interest in social justice and environmental issues." Two students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, along with 11 other students and recent graduates from around the country, are going to live on a bus this summer. Two students to lead sustainability bus tour this summer 13802 2007-05-16T00:00:00-05:00

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By <a href="mailto:acstrombom@wisc.edu">Ariane Strombom</a> and <a href="mailto:nfritz@wisc.edu">Niki Fritz</a> Editor’s note: The <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/">Morgridge Center for Public Service</a> celebrates 10 years at UW–Madison this year. In the spirit of recognizing past service efforts at UW–Madison and in the Madison community, detailed below are 10 notable contributions the Morgridge Center has helped achieve since its inception. <h2> A Decade of Accomplishments </h2> “Hooked on education:” The Morgridge Family In 1994, Tashia Morgridge told former UW–Madison Chancellor David Ward she wanted to help create a center for public service at her alma mater. Two years later, after proposals, planning and a $3 million donation from the Morgridges, the <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/">Morgridge Center</a> was born. “The Morgridge Center is really Tashia’s baby,” says Randy Wallar, assistant director of the Morgridge Center. “She is a graduate of the UW education school, so she has a really strong interest in education both in and out of the classroom.” After its initial creation, the Morgridges continued their commitment to the center, donating another $2 million as well as $2.5 million to renovate the center’s new home, the Red Gym. Mary Rouse, former director of the center and assistant vice chancellor emerita, calls the Morgridges “international philanthropists.” “The Morgridges support educational interests all over the world. They are completely hooked on education,” says Rouse. “They see college students as key in both fostering civic engagement and keeping our democracy strong.” John Morgridge says they see public service as a “win-win situation.” “Tashia and I believe that when public service is done well, everyone benefits,” Morgridge says. “Those of us who participate in public service activities benefit by broadening and deepening our understanding of our communities...those individuals and organizations that are the recipients of public service benefit because they have access to additional talents, time and energies.” Learning through doing: Service learning and community-based research Service-learning courses provide the opportunity for students to participate in organized service activities as part of their normal courses and allow students to reflect on the activity to gain further understanding of course content and an enhanced sense of civic responsibility. During the past 10 years, the Morgridge Center has facilitated the use of service-learning courses in combination with community-based research, where community organizations work with academic groups to produce knowledge that is good for the community. “We try to infuse the curriculum with opportunities for students through partnerships with departments and colleges,” says Wallar. Currently, more than 100 service-learning and community-based research courses exist at UW–Madison in about 50 different departments, in topics such as global health, biology education and landscape ecology. Service around the world: Peace Corps The second day of the Morgridge Center’s 10th anniversary celebration will be almost exclusively dedicated to the Peace Corps, with a dinner and ceremony in honor of past graduates of the program from UW–Madison. UW–Madison has been at or near the top of the list of institutions that have contributed the most members to the Peace Corps for more than 20 years, and the Morgridge Center has played a vital role in promoting Peace Corps opportunities on campus. “Peace Corps volunteers need volunteer experience prior to joining, and that’s important for a number of reasons,” says Greg Pepping, UW–Madison’s Peace Corps campus recruiter. “On this campus, the Morgridge Center is the best way for students to learn how to get involved with community service. That makes a huge difference here, not only in the number of people who serve in the Peace Corps, because they ‘feel’ what service can do for others and for themselves, but also in the quality of Peace Corps applicants from UW–Madison. They’re uniquely qualified to excel as Peace Corps volunteers if they’re already engaged in service and leadership. And all of that starts at the Morgridge Center.” In 2001, Madison was one of three cities around the country that garnered the honor of holding a ceremony for the Peace Corps’ 40th anniversary, mainly because of the 2,500 UW alumni who have participated in this historic program. Grants for innovation: Wisconsin Idea Undergraduate Fellowships Since 1999, the center has supported the Wisconsin Idea Undergraduate Fellowships, providing opportunities for UW–Madison students to expand their reach, share their expertise, serve the community and promote learning outside the classroom. This program offers support to students who pursue innovative projects and work with university faculty or community organizations to collaborate for service learning and community-based research. This year, projects include improving water quality through filtering in parts of Uganda; addressing determinants of health in the Allied Drive neighborhood in Madison; and creating an atlas of the state’s medical providers using geographical information systems technology. The projects that have been initiated with the Morgridge Center’s help since the program’s inception have allowed Wisconsin students to carry the ideas and concepts they have learned at UW–Madison beyond the boundaries of the university, the state and the country, helping to expand the model of the Wisconsin Idea. Students bring hope to Madison area schools: Schools of Hope In 2004, the Morgridge Center joined other Madison area organizations in the fight to close the educational gap between low-income middle-school children and their peers through the tutoring program Middle Schools of Hope. In three years, the coalition of Madison higher education institutions and community organizations has expanded Schools of Hope to include, in addition to the original 20 elementary schools, 11 middle schools and two high schools along with more than 600 UW–Madison student volunteers. The coalition was able to support this increase thanks to a grant from the Wisconsin Campus Compact, an organization of 36 Wisconsin educational institutions that seeks to increase public service in today’s students. The grant brought AmeriCorps VISTA worker Katherine Bolton to the Morgridge Center to help recruit students and foster the partnership. “I think Schools of Hope gives the students a chance to really be listened to,” Bolton says. “It’s not that failing students can’t achieve, it’s their environment. Having a tutor helps a lot. It really empowers the student.” Bolton adds the program also benefits the volunteers. “The volunteers realize what a difference they can make,” Bolton adds. “They have these really huge ‘I-want-to-change-the- world’ goals and they start to realize they can.” The Wisconsin Idea in South Madison: Campus-Community Partnership <div style="float: right; margin-left: 15px; margin-bottom: 10px; width: 370px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/wisweek/28-Feb-2007/images/Science_Is_Fun_kids05_17518.jpg" alt="Photo of a graduate student teaching a young boy how to make a working battery using strips of copper and zinc placed in a beaker." width="370" height="277" /> During a Science is Fun outreach workshop, graduate student volunteer Mike Boll, left, teaches Jacob Zimmerman how to make a working battery using strips of copper and zinc placed in a beaker of chemical solutions. The weekend event is one of many such family-focused activities held at the UW Space Place at Villager Mall in south Madison. Space Place is part of a campus-community partnership designed to create opportunities for children on the south side of Madison. Photo: Jeff Miller </div> In 2001, the Campus Community Partnership opened one office in Villager Mall, after the South Metropolitan Planning Council — a southside community organization — asked the university to for support in helping them address growth and development issues. The partnership combined the expertise of the university with the talent of the South Park Street community to solve some of the neighborhood’s problems. In 2003, the partnership, which includes the Morgridge Center, UW–Madison, Madison Area Technical College and Edgewood College, doubled its office space to include a wider variety of services ranging from legal services and financial education to a space discovery program. “We have been able to provide technical and professional expertise to residents so they can reach their goals, whether it is a better-looking street to more pedestrian safety to expanding businesses to creating opportunities for their kids,” says Lamarr Billups, senior special assistant to the chancellor and director of community relations. “The community has used the expertise to help them achieve their own development goals.” Community/university collaboration: <a href="http://www.volunteeryourtime.org">Volunteeryourtime.org</a> <div style="float: left; margin-right: 15px; margin-bottom: 10px; width: 225px; border: 1px solid #c90; padding: 12px;"> Staff at the Morgridge Center for Public Service can help anyone find the service opportunity that's right for them. Opportunities include local volunteering, special service programs and service learning. To learn more visit the <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/">Morgridge Center Web site</a>, call 263-2432, or stop by the center in Room 154 of the Armory and Gymnasium. </div> In one Web site, a partnership among the Morgridge Center, the United Way of Dane County, Madison Area Technical College, Edgewood College and RSVP of Dane County centralizes thousands of volunteer opportunities in the Dane County area. This partnership is the first of its kind in the nation between the United Way and an institution of higher learning and is serving as a model for other universities. UW–Madison, through the Morgridge Center, provides almost 50 percent of the volunteers accessed through the site, illustrating the importance and value of its position as a founding member. Service learning and fun outside the classroom: Alternative Breaks <div style="float: right; margin-left: 15px; margin-bottom: 10px; width: 370px;"> <img src="http://www.news.wisc.edu/wisweek/28-Feb-2007/images/Fritz_alt_break06_717.jpg" alt="Photo of students digging to create a new garden." width="370" height="277" /> UW–Madison students (left to right) Devon Heim, Jessica Langer and Kelly Patterson work together to transport dirt and create a new garden at the LUPE office outside of San Juan, Texas. In February 2006, the students participated in the Alternative Breaks program through the Morgridge Center and the Wisconsin Union Directorate; the program provides students with service-learning opportunities all over the United States. Photo: Niki Fritz </div> The student-run Alternative Breaks program works with the Morgridge Center and the Wisconsin Union Directorate to give students volunteer experiences that combine service learning, student leadership and culturally diverse locations to create educational and life-changing experiences. Each year more than 250 students volunteer for three days to two weeks in locations across the United States, helping community organization and also broadening their education. In 1990, a group of students created the program to give students a chance to learn outside the classroom. Today the program offers volunteer opportunities from a homeless shelter in Boston to an immigrant outreach organization in San Juan, Texas. “Alternative Breaks are important to every students’ cultural education,” says John Barnhardt, Alternative Breaks director. “Alternative Breaks gives students the opportunity to live and work in elements that they may never have the opportunity to do again. Our organization introduces many students to the idea of service learning, and is the beginning of many students’ careers in service work.” A fun, free concert for UW volunteers: the 10,000 Hours Show On Saturday, April 21, more than 750 student volunteers will enter the Orpheum for a free concert, UW–Madison’s first 10,000 Hours Show, to celebrate the accomplishment of their goal: 10,000 hours volunteered by UW students in one year. Even though UW–Madison student and Morgridge Center peer adviser Katy Resop has been planning the event for more than a year, she still can’t believe it is a reality. “I never thought by spring 2007 we would have $30,000 and 750 volunteers. That really shows something about this campus and its students,” Resop says. “Without the Morgridge Center’s support, the show would not happen. They have really made it a priority.” Although the free concert is a reward for students volunteering 10,000 hours, Resop says the event really isn’t about the concert or the 10,000 hours. “10,000 hours is a numerical goal that is visible. The real goal is to get people to volunteer and to make lifelong volunteers,” Resop says. Looking to the future: The Wisconsin Institute for Discovery and the Morgridge Institute for Research Made possible by a $50 million donation by the Morgridges, the largest gift ever to benefit the university, along with matching gifts from the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) and the state, the Morgridge Institute for Research — in collaboration with the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery — is slated to start in 2010. The Morgridge Institute for Research is the private arm of the partnership, generating collaborative research that will spur new inventions, initiate stem cell explorations, look into new treatments and cures for disease, and aid economic development in the region, all benefiting the state of Wisconsin and the University community. The public arm, the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery, will work to promote interdisciplinary research to amplify the abilities and possibilities for UW–Madison students and faculty. The Morgridge Center for Public Service celebrates 10 years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison this year. In the spirit of recognizing past service efforts at UW-Madison and in the Madison community, 10 notable contributions the Morgridge Center has helped achieve since its inception are highlighted. Honoring Morgridge Center's 10th anniversary 13513 2007-03-28T00:00:00-05:00 2007-02-28T00:00:00-06:00

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Anniversary conference planned On Friday and Saturday, March 9 and 10, the Morgridge Center for Public Service will celebrate a decade of achievement at its 10th anniversary conference, “Celebrating the Many Faces of Public Service.” The conference will focus on UW–Madison’s past as a leader in public service, as well as the current accomplishments and future goals of the Morgridge Center. “We are proud the Morgridge Center is celebrating its 10th anniversary and that we have been a catalyst for civic engagement, but we also want to recognize past service at the university,” says Mary Rouse, former director of the center and assistant vice chancellor emerita. The conference will begin an overview of service by the center’s faculty director, Michael Thornton, followed by a welcome from center founders John and Tashia Morgridge. Speeches and presentations will be made by students, professors and prominent community service leaders, such as David Eisner, CEO of the Corporation for National and Community Service, and Maureen Curley, president of the national Campus Compact. On the evening of March 9, there will be a special dinner with Henry McKoy, the Peace Corp regional director for Africa. <a href="http://www.morgridge.wisc.edu/conference.html">Register online</a> for the event before March 1.