Campus Champion

Participate in public life. That’s been the charge led by Richard Kendrick for the past dozen years, since he helped create an outlet for service-oriented student work through the Institute for Civic Engagement. At SUNY Cortland, topics such as “community service” and “applied learning” are synonymous with his name. Likewise, countless programs focused on politics, health and business development owe thanks to the retiring professor of sociology/anthropology, who served the College for nearly a quarter century in total. A strong bridge exists between the campus and the community. Richard, no doubt, is one of the lead architects to credit.

SUNY Cortland recently won the gold for going green.

The College last week earned a coveted gold rating in a national program that tracks environmental sustainability efforts on college campuses.

SUNY Cortland is one of only 77 campuses nationwide to win a gold rating in the assessment, a program of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. No other SUNY campuses have scored that well, and only one school in the United States – Colorado State - has done better by achieving a platinum designation.

“It is impressive to think how far we have come in such a short period of time,” SUNY Cortland President Erik Bitterbaum said. “When it comes to our sustainability mission, this program illustrates how truly committed the College is to reducing its carbon footprint, using all its resources effectively and raising awareness of environmental issues among our students and in our community.”

The Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System, also known as STARS, is a self-reported assessment that collects a wide range of sustainability information on College initiatives, capital improvements, academic programs and other issues. Once completed, it serves as a baseline for measuring progress on a campus’s environmental goals. It must be upgraded every three years.

In 2012, SUNY Cortland earned a silver rating in STARS. Since then, the College became the first SUNY campus to fill all of its electrical needs with renewable energy, build a residence hall with the highest possible rating under the national Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification system, and earn membership into the federal Environmental Protection Agency’s Green Power Leadership Club. A year ago, SUNY Cortland threw the switch on 3,600 new solar panels.

In 1965, while America focused on U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson’s “Great Society” address, several NASA space exploration milestones and a rapidly escalating Vietnam War, SUNY Cortland was writing the next chapters of its own history.

Half a century ago, the campus acquired a small resort facility in the Adirondacks and a large tract of rolling woodlands and meadows about seven miles south of the main campus.

The timing was pure coincidence, except that both the Raquette Lake property called Antlers and the Cortland County land known as Hoxie Gorge were well suited for course fieldwork in a variety of disciplines. Moreover, they met SUNY Cortland’s need to expand and enrich academic programs for students enrolled in what was then a rapidly growing college.

Since that landmark year, many generations of students have experienced hands-on learning opportunities at both campuses, which today are an integral part of the William H. Parks Family Center for Environmental and Outdoor Education.

Graduates recall with great fondness their time spent at these outdoor classrooms. For some, it was their first close encounter with wilderness.

SUNY Cortland plans to celebrate 1965 as a special, vintage year in College history. This summer, the College community will invite alumni, faculty, staff and representatives of the SUNY Cortland Auxiliary Services Corporation (ASC) — which facilitated the acquisitions — to celebrate the milestones on Saturday, July 11, at Hoxie Gorge and on Saturday, Aug. 22, at Antlers. Details are still developing, and can be checked at cortland.edu/rl-events as the dates draw closer, but here are the basics:

• On July 11, the W.H. Parks Family Outdoor Center, Hoxie Gorge jubilee will be included in the SUNY Cortland Alumni Reunion 2015 festivities as an enhancement to an educational hike that has been offered in recent years to Reunion guests by faculty in the College’s Biological Sciences and Geology departments. The ceremony takes place at the George McDermott trailhead at 11 a.m. Buses will depart from the Lynne Parks ’68 SUNY Cortland Alumni House.
• On Aug. 22, the campus community will gather at the amphitheater beside the Casino building to toast the golden anniversary of W.H. Parks Family Outdoor Center, Antlers. Refreshments will be served. Depending on how many people attend, the ceremony will move to the grassy lawn behind the Casino. A bus will depart from and return to the SUNY Cortland campus to transport faculty and staff guests.

Several faculty members who worked hard to acquire and develop programming at the properties are still living and are invited to the ceremonies.

The Antlers transaction was negotiated on Jan. 15, 1965, with George Fuge, the late director of environmental and outdoor education at SUNY Cortland. The College already owned the remote Camp Huntington on Long Point but needed a more direct and affordable way to bring students and faculty to and from its dock.

“For years, the way we got people up here was to park at one of the local marinas and pay them a fee to transport people over here to Huntington,” said Robert Rubendall, current director of the W.H. Parks Family Outdoor Center. “And in the winter, we had to cross over on the ice from the south shore of the lake. It was not a very advantageous arrangement at all and very expensive because of the fees we paid to the marina.”

Antlers was originally a strategic purchase to give the College docking privileges, convenient parking and offices, extra storage and classroom space, and a way station for travelers preparing to visit Camp Huntington. Within a few years, it was adapted to host a number of student and alumni programs throughout the summer season.

Although it is not listed with the National Register of Historic Places like Camp Huntington, Antlers came with its own long and colorful story. Built in the late 1880s as a small resort and hotel with small cabins, lean-tos and platform tents in addition to the Antlers Hotel, today’s Antlers retains the name but is comprised of only seven original buildings remaining from a large parcel that was gradually subdivided and sold off to private landowners.

Fuge knew the owners and quietly negotiated the purchase through SUNY Cortland’s Student Faculty Association, today known as ASC, Rubendall said. The original acquisition included the Casino, Cedars and the Terrace Cabins.

The accessibility of Antlers to roads and civilization from mid-May through mid-October, especially when ice formation and melt on Raquette Lake prevented travel over the lake to Camp Huntington, quickly increased its use for educational programming.

“It became clear, within a year, that we needed much more space to operate summer programs as well, and that’s when we acquired the hotel, the Main Lodge up above,” Rubendall said. “That has roughly 20 beds, and so that doubled the capacity of the facility itself.”

Fifty years later, classes of students annually use the 45-bed Antlers facilities as a base for their experiential learning or as a launching point to visit the College’s nearby, much larger Camp Huntington facilities. In summer, alumni flock to Antlers beside the pristine lake for programs that allow them to recharge their bodies as they renew their friendships with classmates.

“I think the number of alumni that come back year after year to enjoy Antlers with their families speaks to its value,” Rubendall said. “We just built a new amphitheater there last year and we’re in the process of remodeling the kitchen in the Main Lodge. So the College is really putting its resources into making sure that Antlers continues to be a viable and valuable part of the whole outdoor education process here at Raquette Lake.”

Meanwhile, roughly 1,000 students a year visit Hoxie Gorge with its rushing tributary into the Tioughnioga River, its venerable stand of old growth Hemlocks and its interesting mix of flora, fauna and geology.

Hoxie Gorge was purchased because rapid development on the main campus had eaten up all the surrounding woodlands where professors formerly had taken their students for field studies, said Larry Klotz, professor of biological sciences, who has managed the facility for 25 years as chair of the College’s Hoxie Gorge Committee.

“Fifty years ago, a lot of classes had just walked out the back door and behind Old Main through nature on the hill,” Klotz said. “But the expansion removed all the areas we could get to through the main campus.”

In 1964, four professors formed a committee that spent the late spring of that year surveying, mapping and studying tax records of suitable land in the immediate area around the College campus. These were George L. McDermott, distinguished service professor of geography; John A. Gustafson and Eugene Waldbauer, both biological sciences professors; and Harlan “Gold” Metcalf, the late professor of recreation and leisure studies.

“The purpose was to create an outdoor area for interdisciplinary use by many departments,” Rubendall said.

The committee identified an ideal 169 acres and convinced three separate landowners to sell their adjacent former farmlands to the Student Faculty Association in the early fall. McDermott managed the property for the first 25 years.

“It’s easy to get to, you can go out for a couple of hours,” Rubendall said.

The site has only an outhouse and a lean-to, but it sees heavy yearly classroom traffic. In addition, faculty members and students use it frequently for research purposes, Klotz said.

“There have been about 41 academic journal publications, books or master’s theses done from studies there and $1.16 million in research has been conducted in whole or part at Hoxie Gorge,” he said.

Klotz, who this year turns over chairmanship of the committee to Steven Broyles, biological sciences, and David Barclay, geology, will help organize the anniversary festivities.

SUNY Cortland employees don’t have to run fast to be a part of the College’s J.P. Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge team. But they do need to act fast if they want to attend the annual evening run/walk promoting health and fitness.

Registration must be completed online by noon on Wednesday, May 20.

The College again will participate in the J.P. Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge on Tuesday, June 9. The 3.5-mile run/walk starts at 6:25 p.m. at Onondaga Lake Parkway in Liverpool, N.Y. Registration costs $15 and includes a team shirt, post-race food and drinks, transportation and all event fees. Payment — preferably by check made payable to SUNY Cortland — should be turned in to Chris Tucker or Kerry Mincher in the College’s Purchasing Office.

Participants are free to run or walk the event, and no previous experience is necessary. According to race rules, only employees can represent a company.

Last year, more than 8,500 people participated in Central New York’s largest annual running event. SUNY Cortland sent a team for the eighth consecutive year and its four-person men’s team finished with the fastest overall time, earning a trip to the 2015 international championship to be held in San Francisco in September.

For more information on the event, visit the Syracuse Corporate Challenge website or contact Tucker by email or 607-753-2488.

Cortland Mayor Brian Tobin, at the urging of SUNY Cortland Communication Sciences and Disorders graduate students, tonight will formally proclaim June as National Aphasia Awareness Month.

The action will launch a series of local awareness activities by the 14 students in the master’s program in connection with the National Aphasia Association and the American Heart/Stroke Association.

Aphasia is a language disorder, frequently caused by a stroke, in which people have difficulty finding the right words to express what they want to say. They often unknowingly use nonsensical language in their efforts to communicate.

“There are people in this community with aphasia that are living fairly functional lives but have trouble with daily activities like making a phone call to straighten out a bill or ordering in a restaurant,” said Eileen Gilroy, a lecturer in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders.

“They need members of their community to understand that people with aphasia are not intellectually impaired. They are cognitively intact,” Gilroy said. “They may just need a little more time and patience.”

Gilroy is teaching part of the summer session for students working toward a master’s degree in communication sciences and disorders. She is also coordinating the aphasia awareness outreach program, after winning a $350 SUNY Cortland faculty development grant.

That program will kick off tonight at Cortland City Hall with Tobin’s proclamation and a short public explanation of the disorder by Gilroy and three graduate students: Kimberly Crispill, Colleen Hinrichs and Nicole Scalera.

It continues June 8, when the students will operate an information booth at the annual enrichment day conference held by the Cortland County Area Agency on Aging in Corey Student Union.

Students also plan to make presentations in Walden Place on June 5 and at Access for Independence on June 19.

More than a million people in the United States are thought to struggle with aphasia, including more than half of all stroke survivors. Through therapy with speech and language specialists, many survivors are able to improve their ability to communicate.

Hats off to the class of 2015!

A record number of graduating seniors attended SUNY Cortland’s popular Senior Send-off event, which serves as the unofficial kick-off to the week leading up to the College’s Commencement ceremonies.

The annual social event, organized and sponsored by SPARK (formerly the Student Alumni Association), attracted 714 students to the Lynne Parks ’68 SUNY Cortland Alumni House on Thursday night. SUNY Cortland’s soon-to-be graduates enjoyed free food catered by M&D Deli, drinks and more than $1,000 in prizes provided by the College’s Alumni Association and Student Government Association.

They also got their fix of selfies.

As usual, the highlight of the night for members of the senior class was the ability to pose for pictures with SUNY Cortland President Erik J. Bitterbaum and Ellen Howard Burton. Students, parents, families and friends are encouraged to continue Thursday’s fun and tag their graduation-themed posts and pictures on social media with #Cortland15.

Even Blaze, the College’s red dragon mascot, made an appearance at a record-breaking Senior Send-off event Thursday, May 7.

Class of 2015 graduates also are reminded to register for the Red Dragon Network to continue receiving SUNY Cortland alumni perks and news of networking opportunities after graduation. Thursday night’s raffle prizes included: $500 worth of gift cards to New York & Company and Men’s Wearhouse for professional work attire; a $500 voucher for a graduation party at the Parks Alumni House; 10 complimentary passes to the first-ever Young Alumni Reunion Day (YARD) event at Alumni Reunion 2015; and plenty other SUNY Cortland alumni-themed swag.

Stay up to speed with alumni news and events on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

SUNY Cortland’s Institute for Civic Engagement (ICE), the campus office that leads and oversees countless hours of meaningful student work in the community, has appointed a new director.

Mary McGuire, an assistant professor of political science at the College, will serve in the role. She takes over for Richard Kendrick, who retired after nearly 25 years of service to the College. Kendrick led the institute as director since helping found it 12 years ago.

“It’s been my privilege to work with an exceptional group of faculty, staff, students and community partners at all levels: here at the College, throughout New York state, across the nation and around the globe,” said Kendrick, a professor of sociology/anthropology. “I have witnessed tremendous growth in service-learning and community engagement across all campus divisions, schools and departments.”

McGuire joined the SUNY Cortland faculty in 2001. During her time at the College, she has promoted civic engagement among political science students as coordinator of the department’s internship and field studies program. Her students have worked in many sectors of the political arena, including several local government offices.

McGuire’s personal civic engagement activity includes consulting with the Cayuga and Cortland County legislatures on governance reviews, speaking on local government consolidation and providing insight on topics such as the New York State Regents elections. Her recent publications examine the role of public policy in providing educational opportunities. They also include research on charter schools and post-secondary alternatives to college.

McGuire earned a bachelor’s degree, master of public administration and Ph.D. in political science from Syracuse University. She resides in Fayetteville, N.Y.

Each year, SUNY Cortland’s ICE aims to increase the number of students actively participating in the communities that they make up — locally, nationally and internationally. That work encompasses many different activities, from voting in elections to mentoring local schoolchildren to organizing lectures with international relevance.

The institute also plays a lead role in local programs that include the Community Innovation Project and the American Democracy Project’s Economic Inequality Initiative as well as the application process for several College awards and distinctions. During the 2014-15 academic year, SUNY Cortland re-earned the community engagement elective classification from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and was named to the U.S. President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll for the eighth consecutive year.

The latter honor came after roughly 3,500 SUNY Cortland students contributed more than 200,000 community service hours during the 2012-13 academic year.

The ICE maintains a community presence at Main Street SUNY Cortland, located at 9 Main St. in downtown Cortland, and moved to a permanent campus location in Cornish Hall, Room D-116 during the spring semester.

Learn more about the ICE on the web, on Facebook and on Twitter at @CortlandICE.

Four Cortland area nonprofit agencies benefited in a material way from a unique SUNY Cortland course this spring that focused on the practical side of philanthropy.

The lucky organizations, chosen from among local charities and agencies that submitted applications for a share of $10,000 in funding from the Boston-based Learning by Giving Foundation, were formally announced on May 7 during a ceremony in Old Main Colloquium.

“It was ‎a phenomenal experience working with my colleagues to help Cortland County,” said political science major Tyler Long of Carmel, N.Y., who took the  Philanthropy and Civic Engagement: Learning by Giving class.

“In this class I learned that it is very difficult to decide how to give,” said classmate Euisuk “Dennis” Yoon, a sophomore biology major and exchange student from Seoul, South Korea.

The course is sponsored locally by the Political Science Department and the College’s Institute for Civic Engagement.

During the Learning by Giving Foundation Grant Awards Celebration, the 19 students who took the political science course met representatives from the organizations that will benefit from their many hours of analysis, discussion, consensus-building and decision-making.

SUNY Distinguished Service Professor Henry Steck, a professor of political science at SUNY Cortland, introduced and welcomed the Learning by Giving Grant recipients.

Steck co-taught the course this year with Barbara Barton, an assistant professor in the College’s Health Department and a specialist in community health.

Speakers included Richard Kendrick, director of the College’s Institute for Civic Engagement and a professor of sociology/anthropology; Barton; and Amy Henderson-Harr, assistant vice president of the College’s Research and Sponsored Programs Office.

The students’ grant decisions this year were focused on human services with an emphasis on families and children in need.

The awardees that split the $10,000 and the projects supported are as follows:

• The Cortland Area Communities That Care received an award for $2,052 to develop a plan to assess Cortland County literacy and promote students reading at their appropriate grade levels.
• The Cortland Prevention Resources will use its $2,625 grant to support social and recreational outings planned for participants in its Youth Assist Program, a mentoring program for children between the ages of 8 and 18.
• The J.M. McDonald Sports Complex earned $2,040 in funding for summer camp scholarships and state-mandated camp counselor training.
• The Preble Children’s Center was presented a $2,283 grant to create a garden at the day care center and to participate in a local community shared agriculture group purchasing locally produced vegetables.

The event marks the fourth time the Learning by Giving Foundation had awarded a $10,000 grant to SUNY Cortland so a class could learn about philanthropy by actually distributing the money to not-for-profit institutions that applied. To date $40,000 has been distributed to community organizations. All of the funding is distributed to the local agencies and none can be spent on grant administration.

The Learning by Giving Foundation seeks to advance the next generation's understanding of philanthropy by providing the financial, technological and intellectual tools to experience community impact and to make that knowledge widely accessible through an online forum.

The courses are intended to introduce as many students as possible to the power and potential of philanthropy and to encourage those who may not have explored this area in their undergraduate career.

“My course has three broad purposes,” Steck observed before the ceremony. “The first goal was to learn about the historical, social and political context of charity and philanthropy in America from the colonial period onward.

"The second was a pre-professional hands-on education about the grants process and about the challenges facing not-for-profits in a practical sense. The students were introduced to the tough, tough process of awarding grants to local non-profits and to learning about the needs of the Cortland community.

"The final goal was to help students develop their own values and commitments. The course combines classroom study with experiential exposure to the grants process.”

	Students in the Philanthropy and Civic Engagement: Learning by Giving course were on hand May 7 to congratulate a Cortland Communities That Care representative whose local charity was among those selected as Learning by Giving Foundation grant winners. Above left are students meeting the Cortland Prevention Resources official on hand to accept another grant.

Giving away money may seem like an easy thing to do, but doing it effectively can be very difficult, as many of the students quickly realized.

As the semester wound to its end, the students evaluated eight proposals from the local non-profit agencies and charities. They devised their own fair and effective selection process to identify the most creative, efficient and beneficial community organizations to support. They determined how large a slice of the grant pie to serve each. From the start, they proceeded with their decision-making knowing they might give all the money to one agency or in increments of at least $2,000 to different entities.

With the grant restrictions it was very difficult to narrow the field to four, Yoon said.

“I had to be sort of cold and merciless but also kind of warmhearted, too,” Yoon said. “Reviewing all those proposals I thought was going to be boring. But the more I read, the more interesting it was. What we thought was only a few days of reviewing proposals became a few weeks.

“I think that philanthropy is something everyone should learn how to do,” Yoon said.

Yoon was among several foreign exchange students in the class. Over the years, the course has enrolled students from Romania, Turkey, Japan, Russia, South Korea, and Norway.

For more information, contact Steck at 607-753-4807.

SUNY Cortland senior Shanice Green won’t let financial or educational obstacles stop her from studying abroad this summer in Australia.

Starting in mid-June, the childhood education major from Valley Stream, N.Y., will spend a month observing classrooms and unforgettable cultural places “Down Under,” thanks to a prestigious national Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship.

The congressionally funded Gilman Scholarship program, geared toward students who might not be able to study abroad because of financial constraints, will cover $2,500 of Green’s expenses, making this potentially transformational experience possible.

	Shanice Green

“Today, we are living in a very interconnected world,” Green said. “In order to be successful from a personal, intellectual and professional aspect, one must become a global citizen. Studying abroad in Australia will give me the opportunity to enhance my educational and professional development and also experience personal growth.”

In addition to learning about the country’s education system, Green will travel to see Brisbane, Queensland’s capital and most populous city; Magnetic Island, a small, mountainous island offshore from Townsville, Queensland; Cairns, a regional city founded in 1876 in an area far north of Queensland; and the vast, remote and arid interior region known as the Outback.

Green is only the third SUNY Cortland student to earn a Gilman award. She was one of more than 1,000 undergraduate students from 332 colleges and universities across the U.S. selected to receive the scholarship for this summer from the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. The Institute of International Education, a not-for-profit education organization, administers the program.

“I always imagined that studying abroad would be part of my college experience,” Green said. “However, I never imagined that the road to achieving such a goal would be so difficult.”

After transferring to SUNY Cortland as a junior from Adelphi University in Garden City, N.Y. Green realized that SUNY Cortland’s intense childhood education program schedule presented an obstacle to her long-held dream.

“I transferred in as a junior, and was behind in credit hours,” said Green, 22, who plans to graduate in December. “Many advisors and peers told me that I would not have any time during the academic year to study abroad because of the program requirements.”

Green had an idea to complete her student teaching in Australia, only to balk at the approximately $20,000 price tag for the combined summer and fall semester program called Australian Student Teaching (AST) offered through Education Queensland.

“I stopped and realized that there was no way that my family and I could afford such a costly trip,” said Green, whose parents had emigrated from Jamaica to the United States as adolescents in search of a better life and brighter future. While they worked hard and continuously sacrificed to provide for their family, her mother and father instilled in their two daughters — both now enrolled in college — the value of education.

“I promised myself that I would be proactive in my learning and take full advantage of all the opportunities that my parents didn’t have the chance to enjoy,” said Green.

“My mother was an Educational Opportunity Program scholar at Skidmore College and encouraged me to go for it and try to experience this opportunity,” said Green. “Studying abroad will honor all of their hard work and sacrifices that they have made for me to be where I am today.”

Green found a way to make her dream a reality when she was accepted into the shorter and more affordable Australian Education in the Outback and Tropical Coast program through SUNY Cortland. Participation entails a two-week seminar on the Australian education system as well as a travel component that provides a look at the Australian education system and way of life.

Green also received a $700 Willi Uschald Scholarship through the College’s International Programs. Together with the Gilman Scholarship, that partially offsets her estimated $7,400 in expenses.

According to Mary Schlarb, director of SUNY Cortland’s International Programs office, the Australian Education in the Outback and Tropical Coast Program offers Green an opportunity to engage with Australian educators from diverse schools and communities, gaining a deeper comparative understanding of different approaches to teaching and learning.

“This prestigious award recognizes Shanice’s outstanding academic and personal achievements, as well as her global outlook and interest in infusing intercultural perspectives into her future teaching,” Schlarb said.

“The Gilman program places a lower priority on more traditional study abroad locations such as Australia, and the fact that the selection committee granted Shanice an award to study in Australia confirms the high quality of her application. It also suggests that the Gilman sponsor, the Department of State, is interested in expanding participation by students in teacher education programs, who have historically been underrepresented in study abroad.”

In her short time on campus, Green has maintained a 3.72 overall grade point average while fully participating in campus life, first as a campus Green Rep to raise environmental consciousness among her peers, then as a residence hall administrative assistant and finally this semester as a residential assistant in Shea Hall.

Upon her return to the U.S., Green will complete a required service project.

“I will begin my student teaching at two economically disadvantaged elementary schools in my hometown,” Green said. “The plan for my service project is to volunteer at the after-school programs of each assigned school. My target audience for my outreach will be the ‘at risk’ students, specifically focusing on children 10 to 13 years old. I plan to give these students, who are facing much adversity and hardship in their lives, the encouragement and inspiration to take a risk and to study abroad.”

Schlarb urges other interested individuals to begin the application process for a Gilman Scholarship by visiting the International Programs office in Old Main, Room 219, or the Gilman scholarship website.

“We strongly encourage students in teacher education majors to explore the growing number of education-focused programs and scholarship options for studying abroad, and we encourage all students to come talk with our advisors about the growing number of scholarships available for study abroad,” she said.

“We believe more of our students would be excellent candidates for a Gilman Scholarship and a number of other competitive study abroad scholarships,” Schlarb said. “But students need to plan ahead so they have enough time to put together a strong application.”

Prepared by public relations intern Kate Monno

Heather Kelly Marzullo ’03 M.S.Ed. ’10 urges her students at Hughes Elementary School in Syracuse, N.Y., to see beyond standardized tests. Single-digit scores do not dictate mastery in her classroom. Student success instead is defined by a lifelong love for learning.

And by that measure, the SUNY Cortland graduate and 2014 Syracuse City School District Teacher of the Year is earning high marks.

For the past five years, Marzullo has led a spring field trip that brings students from a high-needs school to SUNY Cortland for a taste of college life. It took place most recently April 29, when 44 fifth graders visited campus for the day.

“The trip is meant to give them a little more motivation than getting a ‘3’ on a test,” said Marzullo, who has taught at Hughes since 2004. “The trips are meant to say: ‘Yes, we’re done with the (Common Core) tests, but remember they’re not the finish line you’re working towards.

“You’re working towards gaining the skills and tools necessary to earn a college degree.”

Marzullo’s youngsters are treated like prospective students during their field trip. They receive a campus tour that shows off the College’s academic buildings, dining halls and fitness facilities. SUNY Cortland’s Admissions Office provides pizza for lunch. The College’s Recreation, Parks and Leisure Studies Department leads them in games and activities.

And their visit also comes with a homework assignment in advance. Each year, the Hughes students make short presentations about themselves — their likes, their hobbies, their career goals — in the Corey Union Exhibition Lounge to SUNY Cortland students and faculty members.

For almost all of them, the trip marks the first time in their lives that a college education is introduced as a real possibility.

“Hughes sometimes gets a bad rap,” Marzullo said. “But I think we have the most phenomenal students. They inspire me every day.”

The elementary school, considered a “priority school” by the New York State Department of Education, pulls from a low-income area of Syracuse and currently is in the process of being phased out because of its test score performance. Marzullo has been offered the opportunity to pursue a certificate of advanced study degree several times, a path that would allow her to become a school administrator or instructional specialist.

“Anybody who spends a day with our students would understand why I’m completely content to spend the rest of my career in the classroom,” she said.

She attributes her outlook to her former SUNY Cortland professors, many of them from the Foundations and Social Advocacy Department. As a first-semester graduate student, Marzullo approached Associate Professor Brian Barrett and expressed her frustration with high-stakes testing. She wanted her students to see the big-picture benefits of an education, so he suggested a trip to the College.

“The most remarkable thing about Heather is her willingness to create opportunities for them,” Barrett said. “She routinely goes above and beyond for them and she challenges them with high expectations.

“Her aims are beyond tests.”

It’s often difficult for teachers to balance both high expectations and a strong rapport with their students, Barrett said. It’s easier to sacrifice one for the other. But Marzullo, who will teach at SUNY Cortland as an adjunct faculty member in the fall, excels at both.

She makes subjects from reading to math relatable for her students, finding ways to mix in sports and pop culture references when they’re appropriate. She quiets a rowdy classroom with two claps of her hands. She uses her planning time to counsel students who are struggling emotionally.

“I want to be that person who changes their lives and I want them to know that I’m here for them,” Marzullo said. “You take on a lot more than just that teacher role in a lot of situations and I’m 100 percent good with that.”

Test scores aren’t her only measures of progress and success. Instead, Marzullo points to the college application essays she receives from guidance counselors in her district, the ones that credit the impact of her teaching and her investment in students.

“Down the road, I’ll have sophomores (in high school) who come back and say they want to go to college and they comment on that one day,” said Marzullo, referring to the spring field trip to SUNY Cortland. “They want a college education because they saw it on that one day.”

The SUNY Cortland women’s lacrosse team capped a storybook season with the program’s first-ever NCAA title, knocking off previously top-ranked Trinity College, 17-6, in the Division III national championship game at PPL Park in Chester, Pa.

The Red Dragons, playing in their first-ever NCAA title game, had lost to the Bantams in national semifinal games in each of the past three seasons. Led by first-year head coach Kelly Lickert-Orr, SUNY Cortland finished the 2015 campaign 22-1 and tied the school record for wins in a season.

The College ran out to an 8-2 halftime lead in the championship and never trailed in the game.

Sophomore Kristen Ohberg and freshman Hannah Elmer each notched four goals and an assist to lead the Red Dragons in the scoring column. Junior Tara Monaghan netted three goals and senior Emma Hayes-Hurley ’15, who was named the Final Four’s Most Outstanding Player, recorded two goals and two assists. Senior Marilyn Farrell ’15 tallied two goals and an assist and junior Nicole Bello also scored twice.

Sophomore goalie Jaclyn Beshlian stopped eight shots in between the pipes. She was joined on the Final Four All-Tournament Team by Elmer, Hayes-Hurley, Monaghan and Ohberg.

The win marked SUNY Cortland’s 19th in a row and punctuated an impressive NCAA Tournament run that saw the team win four of five games by at least seven goals. After falling behind 4-0 to Middlebury College in the national semifinals, the Red Dragons came storming back for a 19-12 win.

The 2015 campaign also saw the women’s lacrosse team win its 17th straight State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) title and push its home winning streak to 67 games. The program previously played in the 1984 United States Women’s Lacrosse Association (USWLA) national title game in 1984.

The national championship is the College’s first team title since the men’s lacrosse squad won an NCAA crown in 2009. The SUNY Cortland Athletics Department now boasts 24 national team titles in its history, including 18 NCAA championships.

Less than 24 hours after throwing two scoreless innings to deliver a dramatic, come-from-behind SUNY Cortland victory over Amherst College in an NCAA Division III New York Regional tournament game Thursday night, junior relief pitcher Tyler Brien planned to be fulfilling a military obligation.

Brien, a crucial piece of the team’s bullpen all season, reported to Fort Drum, near Watertown, N.Y., Friday afternoon to fulfill his monthly commitment to the U.S. Army National Guard.

The six-foot-five right-hander was the beneficiary of a rare military exemption waiver early last week. The NCAA Division III Baseball National Committee allowed SUNY Cortland to include Brien on its 25-man playoff roster for the regional’s opening two days Wednesday and Thursday at Falcon Park in Auburn, N.Y., and then replace him for the remainder of the tournament.

Update: SUNY Cortland punched a ticket to the Division III World Series in Appleton, Wis. — the team’s third championship trip in four years — after capturing the New York Regional crown over the weekend.

“It’s a unique situation for sure,” said head coach Joe Brown, who has guided the nationally top-ranked Red Dragons to a 40-4 mark and was named State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) Coach of the Year. “We were nervous because we didn’t know how it would turn out.

“But no doubt, it was the right thing to let him play.”

Brien approached his head coach a week before regional action and made him aware of the potential conflict between his National Guard training and NCAA tournament action. Once a month during the school year, Brien is required to travel to Fort Drum. Those monthly trips forced him to miss two weekend series during the regular season. Under normal circumstances, the only acceptable exemption is academic work. Final exams, however, wrapped up at the College this week.

Brown immediately notified a regional representative, who forwarded SUNY Cortland’s request to submit two 25-man rosters — one with Brien and one with a replacement player — to the national committee. The team learned last Tuesday night that the waiver was granted.

“I was pumped,” said Brien, an Ilion, N.Y., native who joined the National Guard more than two years ago as part of a six-year commitment. “And then after last night’s win, we were even more jacked up.”

The Red Dragons won their opening game of the regional Wednesday afternoon against Oberlin College thanks to a three-run rally in the bottom of the eighth inning. On Thursday, they trailed Amherst 5-0 in the top of the seventh inning and then 5-2 when Brien came in to pitch with a runner on base in the bottom of the eighth.

He kept Amherst off the scoreboard. SUNY Cortland erupted for five runs in the top of the ninth and he closed the door with two strikeouts in the bottom of the inning. When asked whether he was more nervous about his relief pitching duties or his upcoming military training at Fort Drum, Brien didn’t balk.

“Pitching in that type of game is tougher, no question,” he said. “The whole team’s relying on you to minimize the damage.”

But Brien, who last summer trained at Fort Benning, Ga., was quick to draw similarities between the two experiences.

“You’re only as strong as the guy next to you (in the military),” he said. “It works like that in baseball too.”

The Red Dragons will now make their seventh World Series trip since 2005 and 13th overall. They open open up against No. 24 nationally ranked Webster University (Mo.) Friday, May 22, at 1:15 p.m.

“The goal is to keep this thing rolling,” said Brien, who pitched in last year’s World Series. “I don’t want (Thursday) to be my last appearance of the year.”

Brown agreed that the team will keep chipping away at a bigger goal. But the head coach also took a minute to savor a special moment in the dugout Thursday night.

“The guys congratulated him in the dugout after the game,” Brown said. “And then everyone says, ‘Alright, now go serve your country.’”

SUNY Cortland honored 62 students, two faculty and staff members and one student club for their contributions to the College at the 30th Annual Student Leadership Recognition Banquet held April 16.

Following are the award recipients:

Outstanding Student Leaders

Jocelyn Almodovar

Shannon Boreali

Rachel Burton

Marissa Cabrera

Kaylee Cunningham

Kyle Davis

Brittnie Daugherty

Brooke DeMarco

Jillian DiRoma

Kaileigh Domster

Michael Doris

Kaitlyn Espina

Asantewa Feaster

Natalie Finkle

Samantha Glassman

Jayla Greene

Lamard Herron

Thomas Hughes III

Meagan Jean

Sarah Kelly

Nicole LaFreniere

Carlos Lemus

Aaron Lober

Aubrey Martin

Sean McNoble

Katherine Milanes

Kathryn Mryglod

Samantha Murphy

Lucila Mutino

Rikki Paribello

David Paulino

Lindsey Pestle

Ashlee Prewitt

Jordan Ramos

Juan Rodriguez

Kimberlee Roe

Jonathan Rosen

Samantha Schips

Karyn Scott

Kaitlyn Seager

Lorena Silva

Parker Simoni

Melanie Sjoblom

Jaclynn Soranno

Rebekah Springer

Brooke Stevens

Catherine Suhovsky

Kelly Taveras

Anthony Terzolo

Briana Tharas

Sally Velasco

Abigail Wentlent

Jessica Whelan

Nicole Whelan

Sarah Wood

Jessica Zdrowak

Excellence in Leadership

Jocelyn Almodovar

Michael Doris

Jordan Ramos

Jonathan Rosen

Parker Simoni

Outstanding Senior

Sarah Kelly

Leadership in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Award

Jonathan Rosen

Leadership in LGBTQAI Advocacy Award

Court Pinero 

Student Government Association Awards

Outstanding Staff Member – Cheryl Hines, Advisement and Transition

Steven J. Barnes Outstanding Faculty Member – Cathy Smith, Health Promotions

Outstanding Club Member – Erica Dailey, SAFER

Outstanding Club/Organization – SAFER

Outstanding Senator – Monique Curaj

Michael C. Holland Memorial Scholarship – Brittnie Daugherty, Everett Phillips, Bridgette Thurman

Greek Leadership Awards:

Chapter Leadership Award - Michael Braun, President of Delta Chi Fraternity

Retired Admiral Named Vice President for Finance

David M. Duryea, a retired U.S. Navy rear admiral, joined SUNY Cortland as vice president for finance and management March 2. As the College’s chief financial officer, Duryea ensures financial solvency through development, oversight, planning and implementation of appropriate fiscal policies. He provides leadership, vision and direction for the Business Office, Facilities Management and Human Resources and is campus liaison to the Auxiliary Services Corporation and the SUNY Cortland Child Care Center. He also serves in President Erik J. Bitterbaum’s Cabinet. A native of Orchard Park, N.Y., Duryea earned a B.S. in geomechanics from the University of Rochester’s School of Engineering and Applied Science and an M.A. in administrative sciences from George Washington University. He attended executive education courses at the Naval Post Graduate School, University of Virginia Darden School of Business and University of North Carolina Kenan-Flagler Business School. A career submarine officer, Duryea possesses more than 30 years of executive leadership and management expertise. He commanded the nuclear powered submarine USS Florida. As commander of the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, he led 6,500 civilian personnel in 15 locations across the U.S. and overseas while overseeing a $1.6 billion budget. Duryea is a certified Department of Defense program manager and has extensive experience working with Congress, local government, unions, law enforcement, industry, international partners, university research laboratories and federally funded research and development centers. He is a member of the Naval Submarine League and the Military Officers of America Association.

Rob Shutts was promoted to director of facilities planning, design and construction, reporting to the Facilities Management Office, which announced the change May 14. He replaces Jeffrey Lallas, who retired in July 2014. For almost a year, Shutts has served as interim co-director of the Facilities Planning, Design and Construction Office alongside Juanita Larrabee. He joined SUNY Cortland in 2011 as facilities project coordinator. Previously, Shutts was a senior designer/project architect for Syracuse architectural and development firms. A licensed architect, he earned a B.A. in architecture from Syracuse University.