Elon Periclean Scholars

Class of 2016 Update

By eluther2 | Published November 24, 2013

Last week has been filled with great progress! We have continued to work through out feasibility projects, analyzing and deciding which partners and what subject matter we want to pursue! These presentations looked at feasibility in terms of our timeline in Periclean Scholars, the accessibility of the various projects and contacts, what we would do in the partnership, and the projects’ sustainability.

The first presentations discussed partnering with our contact Cargill, a food packing company that Dr. Arcaro and Professor Post visited over the summer in San Pedro Sula, and ¿Vos qué harás por Honduras?, which is a grassroots social movement that is attempting to empower and inspire Hondurans to better their communities through taking positive action. We then looked into working with various organizations that deal with water issues, food and sustainable farming projects, and numerous avenues to working with education issues. Both Cargill and ¿Vos qué harás por Honduras? are viable options for our class to discuss in more depth, and the other three possible areas of focus, water, food, and education all have presented numerous possibilities for partners and projects to be pursued and researched further.

The next set of presentations focused on social justices within Honduras, including access to health care, child labor and worker’s rights, and some interesting microfinance options that have our class thinking about how we can potentially use the money we already have in our Periclean bank account. A for-profit business called Tegu, which sells magnetic block toys to kids and provides jobs for Honduran workers in Tegucigalpa, could provide us with opportunities to work on reforestation issues, education, or worker’s rights as well. Tegu’s model was a fitting model with which to end our feasibility studies with, because it is a sustainable model, which creates jobs for Hondurans, puts money back into the Honduran environment, and also donates money to a school that gets children in Tegucigalpa out of working in a trash dump. This school has fresh water, meals provided, computer labs, and a stable campus—it encompasses most of the issues our class has thus far been interested in.

Going forward, our class has a series of difficult decisions to make. Our feasibility studies helped us learn more about the issues and did spawn numerous project ideas, but it’s one thing to brainstorm and it’s another thing to agree on something. At the very least, we’ve learned a lot when looking at models like Tegu, Hope for Honduran Children, Cargill, and more, in terms of creating a sustainable project that we hope to model.

-Erin & Lauryl

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Annual Project Pericles meeting: a report

By Tom Arcaro | Published November 22, 2013

Annual Project Pericles meeting: a report

Annually directors from the entire family of colleges and universities that are part of Project Pericles are hosted by one of the member institutions. At these gatherings there are updates from each campus and a wide array of civic engagement and social responsibility related topics are discussed. The meeting this year was hosted by Goucher College located just outside of Baltimore, and we were treated to wonderful food, fellowship and intellectual stimulation. A highlight of this annual event is dinner at the college President’s house, and this year Sanford J. Ungar was an incredible host.

Jan Liss, national director and me after the group photo.

I always leave these meetings energized by what I learn about the programming at our sister institutions and come back to campus with a multitude of ideas that I share with colleagues here at Elon.

One major topic of conversation at this year’s meeting was the ‘mapping’ project that all our campuses are working on (due December 16th!!). Our charge is to describe and document all of the various civic engagement and social responsibility initiatives on our campus. Data from all 29 Periclean institutions will be summarized in a ‘white paper’ that will become a significant point of conversation for a meeting of key administrators from each campus that will take place this coming July.

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Periclean Scholars Class of 2014 Global Pods Presentations

By Tom Arcaro | Published November 22, 2013

Periclean Scholars Global Pods Presentations

On November 11 and November 12 of 2013, the Periclean Scholars class of 2014 presented information and insight into the culture, present issues, and potential future growth in Central Appalachia as a part of the Global Experience Pod presentations. Presenters included Ross McFarland, Mel Witman, Cassie McClellan, Brittany Graham, and Opal Patel. Factual background information was presented along with clips from documentaries such as “The Last Mountain” and “Oxyana,” as well as the personal ties the class has through the Periclean program.

The presentation opened with an introduction to the areas of focus of the class, followed by a clip from “A Thousand Little Cuts,” a mountain top removal documentary, that includes an interview with the class’s partner, Lorelei Scarbro. Presenters then continued into a history of the region, including coal camps, an explanation of coal in general, and the mountaintop removal process accompanied by footage from the class’s flyover experience in Central Appalachia. Environmental impacts were covered next, including the mass destruction of mountains, rivers, and wildlife, among other things. This topic also ties directly into health impacts through the contamination of drinking water, black lung development, drug abuse, and excessive cancer and birth defect rates that occur from living in proximity to mining sites. This section was also complemented with an interview with Ron Carson, a black lung specialist that the class has been working with and learning from in the region, as well as a clip from an upcoming documentary entitled “Oxyana,” which delves into the darkness of Appalachia’s Oxycontin addiction issues. The final component of the presentation included politics, legislation, and economy effects, clearly illustrating how expansive and invasive the effects of mountaintop removal truly can be in one community or region.

Overall, response from the audience went above and beyond expectations! The audience became interactive in that they provided their home zip codes which were utilized to present a visual of the mountains from which their energy was coming from on the website http://ilovemountains.org/my-connection. There were many thoughtful and comprehensive questions posed, as well as apparent interest in joining efforts in Central Appalachia toward a more sustainable lifestyle and becoming a member of the Periclean Scholars of 2017. Pins, stickers, and brochures were distributed widely, extending the “I Love Mountains” message of Appalachian Voices and the Periclean Scholars class of 2017 more prevalently across campus.

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Class of 2015 organizes an awareness event on modern slavery

By Tom Arcaro | Published November 22, 2013

Title: Restaveks: Modern Day Slavery in Haiti

Date and Time: November 22 from 4:30-6:00pm

Location: Iconic Plaza (near Moseley)

Guests:

Detective Destinie Dew from Burlington PD

Member of Alamance for Freedom Leadership Team

Periclean Scholar(s) from the Class of 2015 to Haiti

Description: A photo walk displaying the situations of Restaveks (domestic slaves) in Haiti. This will be followed by a discussion with members of Alamance for Freedom, a local coalition seeking to end human trafficking in Alamance County, and Periclean Scholars who are focusing specifically on the human trafficking in Haiti known as the Restavek system.

Steering Committee Notes 11/21

By Susie Masecar | Published November 21, 2013

Class Updates

2016s: The class has been doing feasibility studies and successfully ruled out some infeasible areas of focus. Now they are exploring areas of focus that touch on several issues, such as education and water. The class is also working on final projects. These projects vary from the Cookies to Gogo, updating the portfolio, hosting a Honduran dinner, to communicating with other universities in Honduras, etc.

2015s: The class has two events going on this month! Today, there is a human trafficking panel in Lakeside 214 from 4:00-6:00. Tomorrow there will be a human trafficking/restavek walk in the Iconic Plaza from 4:30-6:00. Outside of that, the class is working exploring opportunities for partnership with their local and Haitian partner, as well as awareness events on campus, for next semester. They are exploring the idea of creating an endowment for students from Restavek Freedom Foundation to attend either Elon University or Elon Academy, but much more discussion is necessary to determine whether it would be beneficial or not. Elon’s international education week may focus on Haiti. They are planning for Alamance for Freedom’s board meetings as well as contributing to their Freedom Run, a 5k to raise the organization’s funds.

2014s: The class is going up to Appalachia a couple days after exams for their Christmas dinner! The fridge for that dinner is currently on the fritz and needs to be replaced. The weekend prior to the dinner, toys are given out for the Christmas season. The class is collecting donated toys (donate them in Lindner!!) for this as well as buying extra toys from Midnight Munchies. Last year, the cap was set at 77 kids, and 14s would love to exceed that cap. They are also collecting monetary donations. The 14s are also working on their Indigogo documentary. The class’s final product is planned to be a comprehensive book of the people they’ve met in Appalachia, and their activities and experiences.

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Mission Statement!

By Sydney Harris | Published November 20, 2013

The Periclean class of 2016 has decided on our mission statement. It was a process but with some collaboration it ended up working out very smoothly. To begin with we decided on a small committee to lead the mission statement writing, that committee was composed of Drew and I. To begin with Drew and I sat down and talked about all the things that we thought were important to include in our mission statement. The list ended up being this…

Main Goal- Lasting Sustainable Change

-Build partnering relationships with each other, Honduran people, (local community?)

-Advocacy (either Honduran people) (or for the issue that we chose to focus on)

-Create the lasting sustainable change

-Inspire other people to be interested in service/ civil engagement…. involvement in the future

We then came up with our preliminary mission statement, which included the list that we had made. We presented it to the class and let them ask questions. After answering questions and comments we asked the class to partner up and write down what they would like to change or have included in the mission statement. The list that we came up with from all of their suggestions was this….

-Pan Periclean

-Adding whom we are going to partner with

-Adding what our field of focus is

-Interpersonal growth

We took our classmates ideas into consideration and then we reworded and did some finial changes on our mission statement and presented it to the class again. We had some discussion about if we wanted to include our in our mission statement a commitment to the local community. In the end we decide that if community involvement becomes a bigger part of out class in the future we will add it to our mission statement. We also talked about how once we decide our place of focus and our project then we will change our mission statement to reflect our goals in that community and project. Then we finished with some slight rewording.

Our final mission statement as of Fall 2013 stands as such-

Our mission as the Periclean Scholars class of 2016 is to make a positive, lasting and sustainable change in the Honduran community that we choose to take part in. By becoming advocates for and partners with a Honduran community as well as continuing to participate in our field of focus, we will inspire others to become involved in creating positive change and furthering the Periclean Scholars program in the future.

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’15 Class Progress

By Susie Masecar | Published November 19, 2013

As we continue to explore and build our relationships with Alamance for Freedom and the Restavek Freedom Foundation, we would like to make some announcements of upcoming events:

TOMORROW November 20th: A human trafficking panel will be in Lakeside from 4:00-6:00PM

THIS FRIDAY November 22nd: Join us for a modern slavery walk in the Iconic Plaza (the new outdoor addition to Moseley by the Speakers’ Corner) from 4:30-6:00. The walk will feature photographs that provide insight to victims’ lives, a reflection, and a discussion panel (including a representative from Alamance for Freedom). Our class will also be taking orders for bracelets made by girls of the Restavek Freedom Foundation as well as selling baked goods.

We hope to see you at these events!

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A Successful Fundraiser!

By schulz10 | Published November 17, 2013

Last Wednesday, November 13^th Briana O’Neil, Olivia Ackerman and I (2010s) hosted a fundraiser to support the completion of the nurses’ quarters at the Kpoeta Clinic. We are thrilled to report it was a success!

Shortly after Olivia moved to the Washington DC area this past summer, the three of us met for dinner to catch up. We of course spent most of that time reminiscing about Periclean Scholars and talking about our community partnership. We heard that the construction of the nurses’ quarters had slowed significantly. This was almost entirely due to our decreased flow of funds to support the purchase of materials, etc. After graduation we expected our class’ fundraising efforts would not continue at the pace we had achieved as undergraduates, but we had to admit we could be doing more to further advocate for our initiatives with our partners in Ghana. So we decided to pool our efforts to plan a fundraising event here in DC. We wanted to have a low-key event so that planning wouldn’t be too time-consuming considering our busy schedules. Since we hadn’t done something like this before, we didn’t set a set specific fundraising goal. Our aim was to spend little to no money organizing the event, invite as many people as possible, raise more funds than we could contribute independently, and have a good time doing it! We thought this would be a great way reconnect with our inner Pericleans and get involved with our class projects again.

Planning the event wasn’t a burden because we delegated the various tasks and time necessary to pull the event together. Our first step was to secure a venue and band then we tackled promoting the event. After looking into hosting fundraisers at a few different bars, we quickly realized we didn’t want to have to be held to minimums since we weren’t sure what attendance would be like. Luckily we connected with the owner of Haydee’s, a popular El Salvadorian restaurant. The owner, Haydee, loves to support causes as a way of attracting more clients on week nights. Briana, Olivia and I agreed having live music would definitely draw more people. My neighbors recently formed a band and one of their first performances was an open mic night at Haydee’s a couple months ago. I told the band about the cause and asked whether they would like to headline for the event in-kind. They loved the idea, especially since it would also be a great way to get more exposure. With the plans confirmed, we then created a facebook event, Evite, and hard copy flyer to promote the cause, restaurant and band. Our primary marketing strategy was to tell all our friends and co-workers about it, and reminded them multiple times. It paid off!

Around 6:30pm on Wednesday our friends started arriving at Haydee’s. We setup a table with flyers and a donation bucket at the front door and encouraged people to contribute $8 to see the band and support the completion of the nurses’ quarters. We also reminded everyone to write “support the clinic” on their receipts since Haydee’s was donating a portion of the profits on food and drink sales. The restaurant started filling up as the band got fired up. In between sets we shared information about the the Kpoeta Clinic and Periclean in general. We read a recent email from our community partners and each took turns talking about our respective visits to Kpoeta. It was incredible to see so many friends there having a good time!

Haydee’s was also pleased to see a full-house so early on a Wednesday evening. Briana, Olivia and I were blown away by everyone’s generosity. And the band was a big hit too. In fact, the owner liked them so much that she booked them for their first paid gig next month. Everyone involved got something very positive out of the event indeed! Check-out the band here and if you’re in DC on Dec. 6^th come to Haydee’s Restaurant in Mt. Pleasant.

OUR FUNDRAISING GRAND TOTAL: $1,050.00

WOW!! We’re so excited to send these funds over to Kpoeta to help complete the nurses’ quarters. Pulling this off was totally do-able and I encourage my fellow Percielan alumn to try something similar. We had so much fun; we’ve already been talking about doing another event in the spring J

It was just really wonderful to work with fellow Pericleans again! It was nice having the moral support and sense of accountability and collaboration from fellow Pericleans who share in the mission and vision of the project. Proud to be a Periclean!

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Class of 2017-Namibia

By Tom Arcaro | Published November 16, 2013

Class of 2017-Namibia

The Class of 2017 is currently being recruited by their Mentor Dr. Carol Smith and will be inducted this April. Application information can be found on the main Elon University Project Pericles web site.

Namibia was the nation of focus for the inaugural Class of Pericleans, the Class of 2006. Revisiting Namibia will deepen the Elon footprint in that nation and fulfill the promise of the program to emphasize sustainability of impact wherever we go in the world.