Emily “Libby” Egan was one of four seniors to be honored by the Harward Center for outstanding community-engaged academic work. Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

The seventh annual Bates College Harward Center for Community Partnerships Awards recognized 18 individuals and organizations in a celebration at the Edmund S. Muskie Archives on May 8, 2013.

The Harward Center provides Bates students, as well as staff and faculty, with opportunities in community-engaged research, volunteerism and environmental stewardship. Firmly rooted in the academic purpose of the College, the center is a focal point for connected learning that fuses academic discussion and community. In union with this mission, award recipients connect Bates with the larger community through collaboration, research and service.

Here are the 2013 honorees:

• Susan Hayward, former president of the Stanton Bird Club, received the 2013 James and Sally Carignan Award for Career Achievement.
• Seniors Emily “Libby” Egan, Jordan Lupo, Erin O’Connor and Edward “Ted” Wells received the 2013 Harward Center Student Award for Outstanding Community-Engaged Academic Work.
• Destany Franklin ’14, Ellen Gawarkiewicz ’13, Juwon Song ’15 and Kimberly Sullivan ’13 received the Award for Outstanding Community Volunteerism and Student Leadership.
• Anita Charles, lecturer in education and director of secondary teacher education, was honored with the Faculty Award for Outstanding New Community Partnership Initiative.
• Professor of French and Francophone Studies Mary Rice-DeFosse received the Faculty Award for Sustained Commitment to Community Partnership.
• Head Men’s Soccer Coach Stewart Flaherty and Dining Services Production Supervisor Keith Pray were presented with the Staff Award for Community Volunteerism, Leadership or Engagement.
• Community Financial Literacy, a nonprofit that offers financial literacy courses and counseling to all refugees, immigrants, asylees and low-income individuals, received the Community Partner Award for Outstanding New Initiative.
• Sherry Russell, former director of the Downtown Education Collaborative, received the Community Partner Award for Sustained Commitment to Partnership.
• The Bates Public Health Initiative was recognized with the Award for Outstanding Community Project/Partnership.
• Nick Bennett, staff scientist and Watershed Project director for the Natural Resources Council of Maine, received the Bates-Morse Mountain Award for Environmental Stewardship.
• Dave Courtemanch of The Nature Conservancy’s Environmental Protection Program was presented with the Bates-Morse Mountain Award for Environmental Lifetime Achievement.

Bargain hunters descend on Underhill Arena for Bate’s popular Clean Sweep sale.

A “garage sale” on a massive scale that benefits the environment, community organizations and countless satisfied shoppers, Bates College’s Clean Sweep returns for the 13th year from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, June 15, at Underhill Arena, 145 Russell St.

As students pack up to leave Bates at the end of the school year, they donate to Clean Sweep all kinds of still-valuable possessions — electronics and toys, household goods and small furnishings, bikes and books, sporting goods and more. Faculty, staff and the college itself also donate items.

It’s a win-win-win-win situation: Shoppers find treasures at bargain prices, still-usable goods are kept out of the waste stream and the proceeds go to local nonprofits, who in turn supply volunteers to staff the sale.

To learn more, please call 207-786-6207.

Bates is one of a number of colleges and universities nationwide that hold such sales. Last year’s event at Bates raised a record $21,223 that was divided among 14 local nonprofit organizations.

Located in Lewiston except as indicated, the nonprofits taking part this year are: the Caleb Group (River Valley Village); Catholic Charities of Maine’s Seek Elderly Alone, Renew Courage and Hope (SEARCH) Program; the Creative Trails Program at Support Solutions; the Dominican Sisters; First Universalist Church, Auburn;

Also, the Justice, Ecology and Democracy Collective, Greene; the Life Center at John F. Murphy Homes, Auburn; Lots to Gardens; the Root Cellar; the Share Center, Auburn; Somali Bantu Community Association; TriCounty Mental Health Services and its Social Learning Center; and the Trinity Jubilee Center.

Darby Ray

In a Q-and-A, Sun Journal reporter Kathryn Skelton asks Darby Ray, director of the Harward Center for Community Partnerships, “If you were a student, what project through the Harward Center makes you think, ‘I’d be all over that’”?

Ray’s answer pointed to a partnership with an elementary school about a mile from campus.

“Last semester one of the education classes at Bates met all semester long at Farwell Elementary School. The students and professor didn’t just visit the school once or twice — they actually held their college course at the elementary school, which enabled an amazing reciprocity of knowledge, insight and energy.

“I love that kind of creative exchange.”

• View story in the May 19, 2013, Sun Journal.

Firefighting technology at work at a Pierce Street apartment building in Lewiston on May 3, 2013. The fire engulfed four buildings and was the second of three multi-building fires in the city between April 29 and May 6. Photograph by Michael Bradley/Bates College.

Three fires in downtown Lewiston since April 29, 2013, have destroyed 10 buildings and displaced nearly 200 Lewiston residents.

The details have been reported in the Lewiston Sun Journal.

As the Lewiston-Auburn community rallies to support the victims, Bates is coordinating campus efforts to participate in the relief initiatives. A Bates response webpage listing events, volunteer opportunities, most-urgent needs, local charities and fundraising initiatives will be updated as needed. Please direct any questions to Kristen Cloutier of the Harward Center for Community Partnerships at kcloutie@bates.edu or 207-786-6202.

Bates Director of Security Tom Carey said that his team is actively monitoring campus buildings and remains in close touch with the Lewiston Police Department. As a precautionary measure, Bates Security has enhanced its overnight coverage of the campus and immediate environs, he said.

• See resources for the fire relief effort.

All Bates residence halls and campus buildings are tied to a central fire reporting station, which goes directly to the Lewiston Fire Department. Bates Security also receives notification and responds immediately when a smoke alarm is set off. Carey has urged the campus community to contact Security at 786-6254 immediately if anyone or any situation appears to be out of the ordinary. 

Kristen Cloutier of the Harward Center for Community Partnerships (kcloutie@bates.edu, 207-786-6202) is coordinating the campus response. In addition to the efforts outlined below, Bates is working to bolster the relief efforts in as many ways as possible, including volunteer recruitment and transportation, food provision for shelter residents, and campus fundraisers. This page will be updated with additional information as it becomes available.

Key Locations: Lewiston fires and the Bates and community response

How to Help

Donate

Given that donation needs are changing daily, some charitable organizations are currently encouraging the public to provide monetary and gift card donations.

On campus, monetary and gift card donations will be accepted at the Harward Center during regular business hours (8am-4:30pm M-F).

Maine Governor Paul LePage has chosen United Way of Androscoggin County to administer the Lewiston Fire Relief Fund. Donations can be made online at volunteermaine.org or in person or by mail at United Way of Androscoggin County, 66 Ash Street, PO Box 888, Lewiston, ME  04243 (hours are 8am-4:30pm M-F). Checks should be made out to United Way of Androscoggin County and indicate Lewiston Fire Relief Fund in the memo line.

Additional avenues of support

• The American Red Cross – United Valley Chapter is accepting monetary donations. They may be made through the website or mailed c/o Executive Director Jennifer Gaylord, 1180 Lisbon St., Lewiston, ME. Memo line: Lewiston Downtown Fires.  Rainbow Federal Credit Union is also accepting donations for the American Red Cross at its Main Street location, 381 Main Street, Lewiston, ME  04240.
• The Salvation Army is accepting clothing donations dropped off at their thrift store location at 720 Main St., Lewiston (hours are 9am-6pm M-Sat). The Salvation Army is also accepting nonperishable items and toiletries at its facility at 67 Park St., Lewiston (hours are 9am-2pm M-F). Contact number for other items: 207-783-0801.

Volunteer

The Androscoggin Emergency Management Agency has been tasked with the distribution of material goods to fire victims as they move into their newly-leased apartments. Volunteers are needed to help deliver items like new mattresses to these apartments. If you are willing to receive volunteer requests for such work during the next 2-3 weeks, please email kcloutie@bates.edu with your name and preferred email address. You will be added to an email list that will only exist for 2-3 weeks for the sole purpose of recruiting and mobilizing volunteers for short stretches (less than a half day) of volunteer work.

Additionally, Maine Housing and other agencies are asking landlords with vacant apartments to post their vacancies for free on MaineHousingSearch.org. MaineHousing also maintains a list of subsidized housing units in Maine.

Take Part

On Wednesday, June 12, Former Governor John Baldacci invites you to a Mama Baldacci Spaghetti Dinner at Lewiston High School (156 East Avenue, Lewiston).  This event runs from 4:30-7pm.  Only $5 per person gets you Mama Baldacci’s own spaghetti and meat sauce, salad with Italian dressing, rolls and butter, desserts, coffee and punch.  Additional contributions will be gladly accepted!

A new Facebook page has been created as a follow-up to the Lewiston Unites: Community Discussion, which took place on May 22 at Longley Elementary School.  The forum offered an opportunity for residents of Lewiston to share their concerns and seek community solutions in response to the downtown fires that took place in May.

The Lewiston Unites Facebook page offers a place to share positive things happening in the community and is a gathering spot for information, events, and activites.  Please visit: https://www.facebook.com/lewiston.unites.

Interviewer Hannah Albertine ’16 of Philadelphia is a writer for the Bates Communications Office.

Like all impending (and intimidating) tasks, senior thesis sits in my mind as a project that will never actually be mine to take on.

But when I met with Taryn O’Connell ’13 in the Bobcat Den, I found myself staring directly at the very thing that had appeared so theoretical and scary to me: a big, black three-ring binder.

Once I was able to catch my breath again after the initial shock, Taryn and I bonded over our mutual love of basketball. Taryn was a driving force on the Bates women’s basketball team all four years.

She recalled for me how strange it was to complete her final game as a college basketball player, and how the ending of her athletic career oddly paralleled her thesis experience.

For her senior thesis in environmental studies, Taryn O’Connell ’13 investigated a debate about Androscoggin River pollution that took place in Lewiston in the 1950s. Photograph by Hank Schless ’13.

She researched a debate about Androscoggin River pollution that took place in Lewiston in the 1950s. Her thesis is titled “Place, Class and Culture: A Case Study of Pollution Debates in Lewiston, Maine, 1953-1955.”

I hear that seniors are told to practice their thesis elevator speech. What’s yours?

My thesis is about the pollution debate between a group called the Associated Industries of Maine, which was made up of the industry heads of the paper and textile companies, and a group called the Citizens for Conservation and Pollution Control.

I got statements from newspaper articles and used primary sources like interviews and pamphlets. I’m trying to see how these groups tried to expand their collective identity in Lewiston using place and class to reach different social classes in Lewiston.

What was the inspiration for your idea?

My junior year I took a class called “U.S. Environmental History” with Professor Joe Hall that really shaped my thesis.

I realized that everything is right here.

We did a project in the Muskie Archives and learned about Walter Lawrance, who was a Bates chemistry professor and the court-appointed “river master” for the Androscoggin.

There was a lot of information about the samples and testing they used to do, and I sat there and thought about how the river used to smell like rotten eggs. I realized that everything is right here. I wanted to learn about our community, and the thesis really pulled in my history buff side with my interest in social movements.

Along with foam and scum in the Androscoggin River, seen in this aerial photo of the Great Falls, circa 1930, was a strong smell. Photograph courtesy of the Androscoggin Historical Society.

Your go-to work space?

I like to do my work in the computer lab of Hedge.

Study-snack of choice?

Hmmm. Well, I don’t know if coffee counts as a snack because I drink that like it’s my job. But I’ll go with trail mix from Commons.

Any moments where you went “a-ha!”?

There were definitely moments where I understood exactly the arguments that the different groups were making. I was looking at the history of Lewiston in the early 1900s when the Catholic church didn’t let its members get involved in labor unions.

Click here to open a PDF file of O’Connell’s thesis.

I had a moment where I thought, “Oh it makes sense that if they’re not able to join labor unions, then they’re not going to fight for labor rights. And why would they be forthright in fighting against pollution if they feel it is going to compromise their jobs?” There were all of these traditions that the community kept with them over time.

How has your thesis experience changed your perception of our Bates community and our Lewiston community?

I think it has been huge to get off campus and do things like this. The more you take a step outside of our little box, the more you get to experience how rich in culture Lewiston really is. It has such an interesting past.

What is your relationship with your adviser like?

Sonja Pieck is great. She’s an assistant professor in environmental studies and also teaches in the Latin American studies program. She’s so helpful and always points me in the right direction. She’s definitely a professor that I respect a lot, and I’m really interested in the work she does with social movements.

What advice would you give me or to your freshman self?

I think I would say make sure to take advantage of what Lewiston has to offer. I wish freshman year I had done something right away to expose myself to that sooner. But I’m really lucky that I’ve been able to see so many different sides of the community through this experience.

What has been the most enjoyable part of working on your senior thesis?

I think my favorite part right now is just looking at it! Just getting it all on paper and putting the information together.

I’m looking at that book and thinking there’s no way I can pull it off.

You think, “I can’t do a thesis.” But everyone does. You just do it.

I’ll get back to you on that, Taryn.

Professor of Sociology Emily Kane. Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

Maine Campus Compact will honor two members of the Bates College community, a member of the sociology faculty and a senior from Brunswick, for their commitment to public involvement.

A consortium of Maine schools dedicated to advancing the civic mission of higher education, MCC will present the Donald Harward Award for Faculty Service-Learning Excellence to Professor of Sociology Emily Kane of Auburn. Kane, who structures much of her coursework around community-engaged research, is one of three faculty members at Maine schools to receive this year’s award.

Kimberly Sullivan ’13. Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

Kimberly Sullivan, a senior psychology major who co-founded the Tree Street Youth Center, a youth outreach program in Lewiston, is among six students at Maine colleges honored with the Heart and Soul Award, recognizing exemplary civic engagement.

Kane, Sullivan and the other recipients will receive their awards in an April 30 ceremony in the Hall of Flags at the Maine State House, in Augusta.

• Read about Emily Kane’s community-engaged curriculum.
• Read about Kimberly Sullivan and Tree Street Youth Center.

Jessica Nichols ’15.

Two Bates sophomores are among finalists in a letter-writing competition designed to teach college students effective advocacy.

Jessica Nichols of Lincoln, Mass., and Kate Paladin of Palo Alto, Calif., wrote and sent a letter to U.S. Rep. Michael Michaud, a Democrat representing Maine’s 2nd District, expressing concern about proposals to pipe tar-sands oil through Maine.

The pair entered the letter in the Letters to an Elected Official program operated by Project Pericles, a national not-for-profit organization that promotes the teaching of social responsibility and participatory citizenship at the college level.

The Bates team and student pairs from four other schools will present and defend their letters at a mock legislative hearing that’s part of the 2013 Debating for Democracy National Conference, to be held March 21-22 at The New School for Liberal Arts, New York City.

Kate Paladin ’15.

Also attending the event as Bates delegates to the conference are two first-year students, Alexandra Morrow of Lebanon, Maine, and Dana Cohen-Kaplan of Newton, Mass.

“We’re delighted that Jess and Kate have been named finalists,” says Darby Ray, director of the Harward Center for Community Partnerships at Bates, the office that administers the college’s curricular and volunteer activities in the community.

“Bates has a strong tradition of equipping students for informed civic action, and Jess and Kate’s well-researched and compellingly written letter is an excellent example of such action.”

The other finalist teams come from Berea, Carleton and Swarthmore colleges and Chatham University. At the March 21 legislative hearing, one team will be selected as the winning team and will receive $3,000 to develop an advocacy campaign related to the issue they wrote about.

The four finalist teams will each receive a $500 award also for use in developing an advocacy campaign.

The issues that the other semi-finalists wrote about were:

• the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program;
• the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act of 1994;
• gender equity in the Pennsylvania Math-Engineering-Science Achievement Initiative;
• and parental notification language in Pennsylvania abortion control legislation.

Students from schools affiliated with Project Pericles sent 57 letters to more than 100 elected officials throughout the United States, proposing innovative ideas on issues ranging from gun control to aerial drones to Alzheimer’s disease. Among other criteria, the letters were judged on the quality of policy analysis and research represented, and clarity of presentation.

This year’s panel of former government officials who will assess the letters and the students’ cases for them includes U.S. Sen. Harris Wofford (D-Penn.); U.S. Rep. Thomas Downey (D-N.Y.); Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke; and U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Constance Berry Newman, a member of the Bates class of 1956.

Founded in 2001 by philanthropist Eugene M. Lang, Project Pericles works directly with its member institutions, such as Bates College, as they individually and collaboratively develop model civic engagement programs in their classrooms, on their campuses and in their communities.

The Many and One rally in Merrill Gym on Jan. 11, 2003, sent a strong, unified message far and wide. Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

Ten years later, at Lewiston Public Library, an anniversary gathering recalled and celebrated that transformative day.

The program featured city and community leaders, among them Heather Lindkvist, a Bates anthropolgist who is special assistant to the president for diversity and inclusion, and Sarah Davis ’10, who during her time at Bates led or took part in various programs that help integrate new immigrants and refugees into the Lewiston-Auburn community.

In 2003, the Many and One rally sought to drown out the message of hate at another rally that same day, by the white supremacist group World Church of the Creator.

The rally also responded to anti-immigrant sentiments earlier that year, specifically the infamous letter by then-Mayor Larry Raymond to the local Somali community saying that the Somalis had “maxed out” city resources and that a “large number of new arrivals cannot continue without negative results for all.”

“The hate group was big, but the local response was bigger,” writes Sun Journal staff writer Mark Laflamme. “Thousands turned out at Bates College’s Merrill Gymnasium in counter-protest, an outpouring that is still regarded as a turning point for the immigrants in Lewiston.”

It was a peak moment, but Lindkvist, quoted in Laflamme’s story, says that the Many and One coalition was just a start. “The coalition was sustained beyond that one event,” she says. When issues of hate and racism emerge on occasion, “we still come together and say we will not tolerate this.”

Associate Dean of Students James Reese listens to the speakers at the 10th anniversary of the Many and One rally, held at Lewiston Public Library on Jan. 11, 2013. Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

Lindkvist tells WGME-TV that the rally “catalyzed and energized people to focus on issues around tolerance, acceptance [and] coexistence and a way that hadn’t been done before.”

Davis, director of Welcoming Maine, a group that introduces immigrants to various city programs and resources, tells WGME-TV that the story of Jan. 11, 2003, is one of “unity, when different people came together from all different walks of life and stood together and raised their voices and said, ‘this is us.’”

• View story from the Sun Journal, Jan. 12, 2013.
• View story from WGME-TV, Jan. 11, 2013

Marshall Ganz, senior lecturer in public policy at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Marshall Ganz, an expert in public policy at Harvard, discusses the leadership of social movements in the annual Andrews Lecture at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 14, in the Gomes Chapel, 275 College St.

Admission is open to the public at no cost. For more information please call 207-786-8272 or email lthomps2@bates.edu.

Ganz’s talk is titled Leading Change: Story, Strategy, Action. The Andrews Lecture is sponsored by the Multifaith Chaplaincy, the Office of Intercultural Education, the Harward Center for Community Partnerships, the college’s social sciences division and the departments of politics, history and education.

Ganz, senior lecturer in public policy at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, has nearly 50 years of experience with the craft of leading social movements. He teaches, researches and writes on leadership, organization and strategy in social movements, civic associations and politics.

Ganz entered Harvard College in the fall of 1960, and in 1964, a year before graduating, he left to volunteer as a civil rights organizer in Mississippi. In 1965, he joined Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers. Over the next 16 years he gained experience in union, community, issue and political organizing, and ultimately became director of organizing.

During the 1980s, Ganz worked with grassroots groups to develop effective organizing programs, designing innovative voter mobilization strategies for electoral campaigns at every level.

In 1991, in order to deepen his understanding of his work, he returned to Harvard and, after a 28-year “leave of absence,” completed his undergraduate degree in history and government. He received a master’s degree in public administration from the Kennedy School in 1993 and completed his doctorate in sociology in 2000.

A signature talk at Bates since 1975, the Bertha May Bell Andrews Lecture commemorates Andrews, who served on the Bates faculty from 1913 to 1917 and created the women’s physical education program at the college. Her son, Dr. Carl B. Andrews, of the Bates class of 1940, established the lectureship.