Campus Champion

Holly Verbeck, custodian in Bowers Hall, is well known in the building for her kindness and work ethic. She was described by SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor Peter Ducey as the first person to step up and solve challenges. Twice receiving a Red Dragon Recognition certificate, the thank-you letters Holly has been given from students, staff and faculty describe her as “friendly,” “welcoming,” and a “mentor and advocate.” Whether it’s dealing with a water leak, cleaning up after construction work or helping prospective students find their way, Holly makes campus a better place to be day in and day out. 

When Vinny Aquino reflects on his time as a member of SUNY Cortland’s Pride Club, he comes back to a common theme: community.

“I think what I’m most proud of is the community that I’ve been a part of,” said Aquino, who has served since his sophomore year as president of the university’s student organization that prioritizes LGBTQIA+ interests.

The senior psychology major recently earned a major statewide distinction to cherish as well.

Aquino has been named the SUNY system’s first-ever Harvey Milk Award for Student Leadership, an honor that provides a $2,000 scholarship in recognition of a student’s work to create a sense of belonging for the LGBTQIA+ community on a SUNY campus.

The award is named after the civil rights champion who became the first openly gay man elected to public office in California. Milk, who was tragically assassinated in 1978, is lauded as one of the most influential LGBTQIA+ elected officials in U.S. history. He also is an alumnus of the University at Albany, a SUNY campus. 

“This is truly wonderful recognition for Vinny and a testament to the importance of Pride and our LGBTQIA+ community at SUNY Cortland,” said President Erik J. Bitterbaum. “I have always known Vinny to be intentional and thoughtful in his actions. He shines as a student leader who welcomes all people, embraces new ideas and models SUNY’s vision for inclusive excellence. To be selected as SUNY’s first-ever recipient of this honor is extraordinary.”

A native of Uniondale, N.Y., Aquino was nominated, in part, for his efforts to help Pride become one of SUNY Cortland’s most diverse student organizations on campus, not only in terms of gender and sexual orientation but also race, ethnicity and ability. As a trans man and person with cerebral palsy, Aquino’s lived experience helped inform his leadership.

“Vinny has created this incredible space on our campus,” said Health Professor Jena Nicols Curtis, who serves as the faculty advisor of Pride. “It is my favorite place in the world.”

Aquino recalls being elected president of Pride early in his sophomore year, during the Fall 2022 semester and much earlier than he ever expected.

“It was kind of like being thrown into the deep end with concrete shoes,” said Aquino. “It was a little awkward in the beginning, but I quickly found my footing.”

His nearly three years as Pride’s president included the direction of many meaningful efforts, from Pride Homecoming events to a New York City trip visiting the Stonewall Inn to campus conversations considering the challenges that LGBTQIA+ students face.

He also helped establish Pride’s annual fall trip to the university’s W.H. Parks Family Center for Environmental and Outdoor Education at Raquette Lake, an experience that brings LGBTQIA+ students to the Adirondack wilderness — many of them for the first time in their lives — where they participate in outdoor activities in a comfortable, supportive setting. 

Even Aquino, who sometimes uses a wheelchair, has swam, kayaked and navigated the rugged terrain with the support of his peers. 

“It’s just a different experience because, on campus, there’s always so much going on,” he said. “So I think it’s good to have a weekend to just slow it down and spend time together.” 

That sense of community drew Aquino to Pride early in his first year at Cortland, a time of transition in a new environment, when he initially struggled to find happiness and comfort.

“Eventually, when I joined Pride and started meeting people, it was the friends I made who gave me the courage to say, ‘You know, I need to come out,’” he said. “I needed to make that leap in my life to be happier and more fulfilled.

“The first couple of weeks after I came out, I felt lighter and happier, almost instantly — like this thing that I’ve been wanting to do for so many years, I’m finally able to be myself.”

In the classroom, Aquino has excelled, earning a 3.92 grade point average. He has worked in Memorial Library and served as a trusted student voice in the Disability Resources Office. Throughout his senior year, he has pursued an internship in social work at Crown Park Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Cortland.

That experience has helped inform his career goals. In the fall, Aquino will attend the University at Buffalo, where he will pursue a dual degree master’s program in social work and public health. SUNY’s Harvey Milk Award will help fund his education. 

“You know, I never did any of this in hopes of getting an award,” Aquino said. “I just did it because I felt it was what I had to do, what I wanted to do, what I felt fulfilled doing.”

While some leaders may command attention with a strong presence, Aquino is recognized by many for his modesty and his calm, reflective demeanor. He passes praise for his recent award to his peers and advocates for the LGBTQIA+ community, crediting their collective effort.

Aquino said SUNY’s recognition helps prove that thriving LGBTQIA+ communities don’t exist exclusively in big cities or university campuses.

“When you think about the queer community, you think about it being in these big cities or at these bigger universities,” he said. “No one really thinks about SUNY Cortland having this big queer community that’s lively.

“What I really hope people know is that even though Cortland’s smaller, there’s a big community here that’s willing to embrace people.”

A new kind of kingdom needed a new kind of queen. The millennium-old and largely forgotten Mathilda of Flanders is being re-introduced as the groundbreaking ruler she was, thanks to Laura Gathagan, associate professor in SUNY Cortland’s History Department.  

It took Gathagan’s new book, The Queenship of Mathilda of Flanders, c. 1031-1083: Embodying Conquest, to bring to light one of the most remarkable monarchs of the Middle Ages. Now, her scholarship on the Anglo-Norman queen has drawn international attention, with Gathagan featured on one of France’s most prominent broadcast channels, French 3, and invited to the French city of Caen to speak at its 1,000th anniversary celebration starting March 20. 

Gathagan’s work uncovered the prominent role that Mathilda had in building up the once pastoral town of Caen into a capital of her region that remains a major port city of France. 

“She was ruthless in the best way,” Gathagan said. “She was adaptable, she was incredibly confident. She’d be successful no matter where she was. ... She would be a CEO of a Fortune 500 company, and she would be on the very top because she doesn’t let anything get in her way.” 

Mathilda married William the Conqueror, duke of Normandy, who later led the Norman Conquest and became king of England. While William has had many biographies that focus on his life, Mathilda was ignored, despite the impact she had on her kingdom. 

Inspired by a lineage connected to German nobility, her leadership flipped her English subjects’ expectations of what expect from their monarchy. 

“Mathilda rules like an empress, she doesn’t rule like a queen,” Gathagan said. “She uses these sorts of models from the German Imperial world to rule England.” 

This style led her to take an active role in the doling out of justice, in spiritual matters and in building up Caen itself as a new center for her and William’s kingdom. Generations after Mathilda’s death, England’s queens, duchesses and countesses continued the tradition she brought to the country. 

Despite Mathilda’s influence at the time, it was hard for Gathagan to rescue her from the hidden corners of history.  

She credited the support of SUNY Cortland and the Maison de la Recherche en Sciences Humaines (MSRH) at the Université de Caen-Normandie in France for fellowships that allowed her, over years of work, to explore a subject she’s been passionate about since graduate school. 

“I’ve had to look for documents and search through manuscripts to find her,” Gathagan said. “And this is one of the reasons why no one has ever written a biography of Mathilda of Flanders.” 

Mathilda rarely appears in the widely read chronicles of her era, but is featured heavily in more obscure documents that underscore the powerful influence she had. 

“She is all over the place in legal documentation, the charters and agreements where she guarantees land and donates land, where she acts as a judge in legal disputes and wields royal justice. Those kinds of documents you can’t find easily, so you have to dig them out.” 

When many of those sources were first examined it was in the 19th century by aristocratic men with the free time, money and education to do so, and when women’s rights were extremely limited. 

“Women couldn’t inherit at all, it was illegal in England and in many parts of France,” Gathagan said. “So especially in English historical circles, there was no indication at all that women were important. They couldn’t imagine a woman who actually had military troops at her fingertips, or who sat in royal justice and adjudicated law cases for everyone.” 

While Gathagan said she was a little nervous to present in French during her roundtable talk at the millennial celebration in Caen, she sees the book and her talk as chances to highlight that the modern world has assumptions about women’s roles in the past that are incorrect. 

“That tradition is a lie,” she said. “Women in the Middle Ages had significant power. They were not passive. They were not legally helpless. They had agency and autonomy and real, honest-to-God power. ... If you want to think about how women are ‘supposed’ to act or how they acted in the past, you need to know what the past really looked like. And it didn’t look anything like that.” 

Much like the relentless pace of Mathilda of Flanders, Gathagan is already planning a new general audience book that will again challenge historical assumptions. With a planned title of “25 Women who Shaped Medieval Lordship,” she wants as many readers as possible to know that the facts of history still have valuable lessons to teach. 

"We’re in this moment where women are being erased right now,” Gathagan said. “If you listen to the news, you see that all the branches of our military have erased or are erasing women’s participation. ... So, we’re watching the battle for women’s visibility happening as we speak. It’s an old story, but it’s also a new story.”

The clock starts ticking for SUNY Cortland’s annual, 24-hour giving day on Wednesday, April 9, and there’s more at stake than ever.

This year the Cortland Challenge donors could unlock more than $200,000 in matching gifts — $70,000 more than last year — thanks to pledges made by numerous generous alumni, faculty and staff, and friends!

Until midnight on Challenge Day, students, faculty, staff, alumni and friends can give to the Cortland Challenge cause of their choice at give.cortland.edu/2025-Cortland-Challenge. These causes include The Cortland Fund, athletic teams, campus programming and more.

That same website allows supporters to learn more about the challenge and follow its progress throughout the day.

“Last year’s Cortland Challenge brought an extraordinary and record-breaking day,” said President Erik J. Bitterbaum. “But if there’s one thing I know to be true about our Cortland alums and friends, it’s that their competitive spirit always rises to the moment. Our challenge day reminds us that special things can happen when Red Dragons come together in support of our current and future students. I am excited to reach for new heights in 2025.”

More than $50,000 in matching gifts for SUNY Cortland will be unlocked throughout the day as certain donor milestones are met:

• $10,000 unlocked at 607 donors to celebrate the community where SUNY Cortland is located.
• $10,000 unlocked at 1,000 donors
• $15,000 unlocked at 2,000 donors
• $15,000 unlocked at 3,000 donors
• A surprise contribution will be made if we set a new Cortland Challenge record by reaching 3,827 donors, just one more than in 2024!

Every unique donor will count toward unlocking matching gifts, said Natasha McFadden, director of The Cortland Fund.

“These gifts will be awarded at multiple levels,” McFadden said, “with our ultimate goal being a record-breaking 3,827 donors to unlock all awards.”

These matching gifts are made possible by generous supporters who have pledged to provide them, including J. Michael Reagan ’78, Victor Rumore ’84, Diane Gill ’70, Anthony Moon ’86, Michael Cappeto ’71, Marcia Anderson ’73, Peter Kachris ’56 and Susan Paul ’64.

Meanwhile, a dollar-for-dollar match for gifts made to The Cortland Fund will be available all day, up to a total match of $25,000, thanks to a pledge by the Cortland College Foundation Board of Directors.

Additionally, several timed challenges will be made throughout the day, presented as opportunities to unlock awards of $1,000 if 100 donors give within the hour. These are made possible by the following generous donors: Cheryl Barredo M ’81, Robert Cohen ’74, Herbert Haines, Patti Vassia ’65, Michael Wallace ’82 and Mark Zeller ’82.

Athletics Challenge returns

The Athletics Challenge is back this year, with $10,000 on the line. The 20 teams have been broken into four categories: small, medium, large and extra-large. Individual teams will compete in their category to win up to $2,500 in awards by unlocking various fundraising achievements, including most donors and most dollars raised.

In addition to those available matching funds, through donor generosity select athletic teams will have extra match money available. The teams are baseball, men’s soccer, men’s ice hockey, women’s ice hockey, wrestling, men’s lacrosse, women’s basketball, cross country and swimming and diving. Donors for specific teams include Chris ’79 and Terry ’80 Grady, Andi Seger ’71, Joan Sitterly and Sue Zawacki ’74, Michael Green ’81, Robert Hildreth ’67, Stephen Langendorfer ’72, Thomas Christiano ’85, John Tillotson ’91, Dennis Fries ’67, John ’64, M ’67 and Barbara ’62 Brugel, Paul Fardy ’63, John Fiorini and Anderson Young.

Academic/Campus Departments compete

This year, 34 participating academic and campus departments will be competing for the most donors, hoping to win awards of $500 to $2,000 for their programs. Additionally, each participating academic and campus area that reaches 15 donors is eligible to win $100.

Dedicated donors also have offered to match contributions to particular academic or campus departments, including Career Services, The Lynne Parks ’68 SUNY Cortland Alumni House, the William H. Parks Family Center for Environmental and Outdoor Education at Raquette Lake, Study Abroad and International Programs, Biological Sciences, Chemistry, Childhood and Early Childhood Education, Foundations and Social Advocacy, Geology, History, Performing Arts and Recreation, Parks and Leisure Studies.

Supporting this friendly competition is the President’s Cabinet, including President Erik J. Bitterbaum, Provost Ann McClellan, Vice President for Institutional Adancement Richard Coyne ’07, Vice President for Student Affairs C. Gregory Sharer and Vice President for Finance and Management Mark Yacavone ’94. Additional match donors include Marcia Anderson ’73, Ed Zambraski ’71, Kim Stack-Myers ’79, Ernie Logan ’73, David Kronman ’80, Frank Rossi, William Baerthlein ’76, Michael Bond ’75, Robert Bookman ’76, Heather Brown ’13, Cary Carbonaro ’90, Marjorie Cohan ’68, Joel Tiss ’85 and Ghirish Bhat and Sharon Steadman.

Additional supporters of this year’s Cortland Challenge include the SUNY Cortland Alumni Association Board of Directors and the Metcalf Board of Directors.

Leading up to the big day, the entire campus community is encouraged to:

• Take part in the challenge by making their own gift, in addition to any they already made this year.
• Encourage others in the campus and alumni community to also give to the Cortland Challenge.
• Spread the word on social media accounts. A good way to do this is by sending your own transformational Cortland story via the #CortlandChallenge hashtag.
• And don’t forget, on Challenge Day, use the hashtag #CortlandChallenge to follow along with other Red Dragons through Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter).

A year ago, Ikenna Okoye graduated high school. Now, the SUNY Cortland Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) student finds himself among the 18 members of an inaugural class of ambassadors for a national program led by former president Barack Obama.

Okoye, a first-year physical education major from Uniondale, N.Y., is representing the My Brother’s Keeper Alliance (MBK Alliance), created through the Obama Foundation. The alliance’s mission is to improve the lives of boys and young men of color through service and mentorship in communities across the country. 

Over the next two years, he and the other ambassadors will lead community projects, advocate for policy, and participate in MBK Alliance events to make that change a lasting reality. 

They will also participate in hands-on service, develop leadership skills through mentorship, and collaborate on community-centered programs. 

“It’s believing that our communities are a unit of change,” Okoye said. 

Okoye had participated in the MBK Alliance during his senior year in high school. He first learned of the not-yet-public ambassadorship while he was balancing senior-year academics, athletics and work when he decided to apply.  

“One of my mentors let me know that it was happening, that this was a new thing that’s coming along, and he asked me if I’ll be interested, Okoye said. “Thank God I was given an opportunity.” 

The MBK website describes Okoye as “passionate about shifting perceptions of role models in Black communities away from gang culture.” 

His mentor in the MBK Alliance recommended him as an ambassador due to his dedication to the program and ability to connect with others, Okoye recalled. Those qualities led the mentor to believe he would make a strong role model. 

In his new two-year role, he will meet with the other ambassadors to develop plans that could strengthen the foundations of the communities where they live and elsewhere. It’s an ethos that’s also seen him become a member of Cortland’s Multicultural Male Initiative, a student organization created to help men of color access education, stay in school and graduate. 

“Ikenna Okoye’s selection as an ambassador for the Obama Foundation’s My Brother’s Keeper Alliance is a testament to his unwavering commitment to uplifting and inspiring the next generation,” said Kharmen Wingard, assistant director of the EOP. “His leadership, integrity, and service embody the very spirit of what it means to be a beacon of hope and change in our communities.”

The MBK Alliance website describes the beginnings of the group as Obama’s response to the 2012 fatal shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin by a neighborhood watch member, sparking rallies and protests across the country.  It lists its main goal as addressing gaps in opportunity often faced by boys or young men of color and helping them reach their full potential. 

One of Okoye's standout moments from his time in the MBK Alliance began after he started at SUNY Cortland. He traveled with other members from downstate to Albany, where they worked with children in an exercise designed to show them what it’s like to be mentors to others. To Okoye, it was a powerful, rewarding experience.

“These kids were younger than us and everything we did mattered, everything we said,” he explained. “The way we acted, our maturity level, we had to make sure that we were really teaching these kids even though we were having fun on the side and eating together. It really showed us what it means to be a mentor. I love that.” 

This spring, 11 SUNY Cortland faculty members joined three of their colleagues from last year in a fledgling democracy engagement program tasked with directly linking Cortland classrooms and the students’ communities — to the benefit of both.

The 11 university educators are participating in the Cortland Applied Learning Practitioners Democracy Engagement (CALP DE) Fellows program, through which they will incorporate applied, that is, experience-based, learning and democracy engagement principals into existing syllabi.

CALP DE Fellows are a community of practice for SUNY Cortland colleagues who want to design or refine their own courses. Students in these courses apply their knowledge to address real life issues, according to John Suarez, director of SUNY Cortland’s Barbara A. Galpin ’68, M ’74 Institute for Civic Engagement.

The original three CALP DE Fellows will reflect on how this work changed their understanding of the purpose and importance of their teaching as well as on new opportunities for scholarship during a sandwich seminar on Thursday, April 17, in Old Main Colloquium.

The presenters, who will begin at noon, are Deborah Silvis, childhood/early childhood education; Gabriel Colella, English; and Jason Page ’08, M ’12, recreation, parks and leisure studies.

Below are the newest CALP DE  Fellows with department and course prefix and title:

• Chelsea Stinson, foundations and social advocacy, FSA 479: Social Curriculum and Behavior Support
• Qwynne Lackey, recreation, parks and leisure studies, REC 129: Advocacy
• Cody Harrington, childhood/early childhood education, EDU 481: Internship in the PDS
• Jose Ortiz, foundations and social advocacy, FSA 100: Urban Education
• Noah Wason, English for PWR 330: Rhetoric in the Public Sphere: Surveillance and social media
• Paul Arras, communication and media studies, COM 235: Introduction to Media Literacy
• Chris Badurek, geology, GRY 301: Climate Change and Society
• Samantha Applin, sociology, SOC 329: Critical Thinking in the Social World
• Xiaoping Fan, physical education, EDU 355: The Physical Education Curriculum: Planning and Practice
• Justin Bucciferro, economics, ECO 105: Political Economy and Social Thought
• Karen Davis, psychology, PSY 329: Special Topics in Psychology [its connection to law]

In early 2024, Suarez was picked to be among 10 fellows for SUNY’s new Civic Education and Engagement and Civil Discourse Initiative, tasked with advancing the 64-campus system’s commitment to civic engagement as an essential outcome of higher education.

From 1999 through 2017, Suarez’s English Composition service-learning students applied course content as they participated in community programs dedicated to, for example, addressing food insecurity and to tutoring and mentoring area youth.

From that, Suarez learned a hard lesson: refocus to enable his students to effect more lasting change by partnering with an appropriate level of government, which can address causes of issues through, for example, changes in policy.

“In addition to working with a not-for-profit agency or coming up with your own project, students are partnering in some way with government,” Suarez said. “The difference is that government not only has greater resources, usually financially, but more importantly, it comes up with the policy, with the laws.”

On April 17, Assistant Professor Page will discuss how he reworked the lecture style course Rec. 293: Recreation Inclusion and Diversity. His students had struggled to connect with outdated syllabus content.

“The onus for me was on starting to connect these overall themes of incorporating greater diversity and inclusion into recreation services but also having the students look at it from a local government perspective so they could understand how all of these systems worked to provide programming,” Page said. “Then students would do some problem solving of issues they had found locally.”

Last fall, Page’s students started gathering data and speaking directly to the recreation professionals in their hometowns, both big and small, downstate and upstate. They analyzed their findings together.

“I think it’s just about creating the spaces for conversations,” Page said. “I think a lot of the challenge we have is in conversations we think are sensitive, for example, ‘What if we talk about diversity and say the wrong thing?’”

His students instead sought barriers and obstacles affecting anyone and everyone.

“In the conversations, we were talking about familiar things, and we felt safer having these conversations,” Page said.

Assistant Professor Silvis will revisit how she reworked a required course for students in SUNY Cortland’s early childhood development major, Integrated Curriculum Development for Young Children. The class already worked directly with children through the Head Start schools of Cortland County Community Action Program, Inc. (CAPCO).

“Students reported learning how to help children cast ballots, create polls and surveys and generally go ‘beyond community helpers,’ which is a standard social studies topic in early childhood education,” Silvis said.

“I hope that, through an emphasis on social studies in early childhood education, my students recognize entry points for democracy engagement starting in early childhood,” she said.

CALP DE  Fellows are awarded a one-time $1,000 stipend to offset the significant time and effort involved in redesigning their existing course.

Ten of the most recent fellowships were made possible thanks to an alum with a long history in education, volunteerism and philanthropy, retired Long Island physical education teacher Barbara Galpin’68, M’74. Last year, she bestowed on SUNY Cortland a naming gift that aims to educate SUNY Cortland students through projects with positive real-life impact. The 11th stipend this year was supported by the Haines Fund, tapped by SUNY Cortland President Erik J. Bitterbaum.

Richard Rivera spent 39 years in prison for a crime he committed as a 16-year-old and deeply regrets.

While incarcerated, he completed a college education.

Now Rivera is paying it forward by working in Ithaca, N.Y., with unhoused people and individuals reentering society after serving time in prison.

Meanwhile, he strongly endorses the educational programs for the incarceration population like those that helped him become a productive and giving citizen after leaving a criminal justice system that ends many people’s chance of establishing a normal life once they’ve completed their sentence.

Rivera will discuss “How Prison Education Changed My Life and Shaped My Career after Incarceration: An Ex-Felon’s Story” on Tuesday, April 8, at SUNY Cortland.

His talk, which represents the university’s 17th Charles N. Poskanzer lecture, will take place from 11:40 a.m. to 12:55 p.m. in Sperry Center Vittor Lecture Hall (Room 105).

The annual lecture is supported by the Charles N. Poskanzer Fund, an endowment named in honor of the late SUNY Distinguished Service Professor emeritus who taught in the university’s Health Department for 40 years.

“Incarceration affects the physical, mental and emotional health of incarcerated persons, their families and communities, and is a public health crisis,” said lecture organizer Alexis Blavos, SUNY Cortland professor of health, citing a 2019 article in the National Academies Press.

The Prison Policy Initiative website contains the following data about incarceration in America:

• 1 in 3 people behind bars are being held in jail and have not been tried in court
• Nearly 2 million Americans are in local jails, state prisons or federal prisons and jails
  
  On the justice.gov website notes that:
• Today, over 70 million Americans have criminal records
• 95% of incarcerated people will eventually be released from prison
• Close to 70% will reoffend and end up back in prison (according to U.S. Attorney Jacqueline C. Romero)

One way to address that is to offer educational programming with college credit to incarcerated inmates.

In 1995, Rivera earned a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from Syracuse University. In 2021, he followed that up by receiving a second Baccalaureate degree, this time in sociology, from Bard College.

Rivera was released on parole in 2019 after serving 39 years for firing a gun and killing a man during a botched, unplanned robbery in a Queens bar.

Soon after, Rivera began coordinating programs for the Endeavor House, residential housing for formerly incarcerated men in Ithaca. In 2020 he became reentry housing taskforce coordinator with Ultimate Re-Entry Opportunities, working with those impacted by incarceration and policy makers to effect structural change.

Also starting in 2020, he has been the outreach navigation coordinator for the nonprofit Opportunity, Alternatives and Resources (O.A.R.), which protects the civil liberties of those incarcerated in the Tompkins County Jail. In 2021 he spoke at the UNIS-UN Conference 2021, a United Nations International School event focused on “Pandemics and Carceral Environments.” 

He was appointed in 2022 as associate director of academic reentry service for the Cornell Prison Education Program. That year, he served as a panelist at Yale University’s 2022 Imagination and Incarceration Symposium.

Since 2024, Rivera has served as assistant to the executive director for special initiatives in the Center for Community Alternatives in Ithaca, N.Y.

Rivera co-founded and created the Sunflower Housing and Supportive Services of Tompkins County.

He has been a special consult to the Freedom Reads project, which establishes libraries in prisons. Rivera has been a researcher with the Tompkins County Reimagining Public Safety Collaborative, and is a member of the Working Group Reimaging Public Safety Collaborative Tompkins County. He advises the Reimaging Policing Internal Resource Group of Tompkins County, parole preparation at Cornell University, the Cornell Prison Education Program (CPEP) Alumni Advisory Council and the Community Foundation of Tompkins County.

He is the author of two articles, one on “I Survived Prison During the AIDS Epidemic. Here’s What It Taught Me About Coronavirus” for The Marshall Project, a nonprofit online journalism organization; and another on “Traumatized to Death: The Cumulative Effects of Serial Parole Denials,” for the CUNY Law Review.

A certified peer counselor, he is an HIV/AIDS counselor and trainer who can interpret and translate Spanish.

April is Second Chance Month to recognize the importance of helping individuals, communities, and agencies across the country appreciate their role in supporting the safe and successful reentry of millions of people returning from incarceration each year. The federal Second Chance Act, passed with overwhelming bipartisan support in 2008 and reauthorized in 2018, has paved the way for groundbreaking nationwide initiatives aimed at rebuilding lives and strengthening communities.

The Poskanzer fund was established through the Cortland College Foundation as an endowment to support an annual public lecture offered by the university’s Health Department in honor of its former colleague. The presentation brings national leaders in public and community health to campus to meet with students and faculty and to deliver a public lecture on a current public health issue.

The lecture is also supported by the Health Department and the Provost’s Office.

SUNY Cortland will recognize the achievements of graduating seniors who have embraced both their own diversity and that of the campus with its annual Kente Celebration on Saturday, April 5.

This year, 52 graduating seniors will don multicolored Kente stoles, watched by some 150 family members and friends as they embrace a more than 30-year-old campus tradition with roots in Africa.

Presented by the Kente Committee and Multicultural Life and Diversity Office, the Kente Celebration — an ancient Africana rite of passage for learners and scholars who are transitioning from institutions of higher learning to the next chapter of their lives — will begin at 4 p.m. in Corey Union Function Room. Dinner and the ceremony will start at 5 p.m.

Registration to attend the evening of photos, dinner, ceremony and socializing is closed. However, it’s not too late to register to participate in the ceremony virtually.

Diedre Kirkem ’19, a former psychology major who is an Educational Opportunity Program counselor at Tompkins Cortland Community College in Dryden, N.Y., will deliver the keynote speech.

Herself a past Kente Celebration participant, Kirkem returned to her alma mater in March to speak with current students about psychology careers.

Before joining TC3 in 2022, she previously was a health home care manager with Berkshire Farm Center and Services for Youth in Cortland, N.Y., and since graduation also was a case manager for the Center for Urban Community Services in the Bronx, N.Y.

As a student, Kirkem was the Black Student Union’s vice president, participated in Africana Dance and La Familia Latina, and worked as a residential counselor with Catholic Charities in Cortland.

Also during the Kente Celebration, the Calvin Louis-Juste ’09 Memorial Award, NAACP Award and Kente Honorary Stole nomination winners will be announced.

• The Calvin Louis-Juste ’09 Memorial Award represents one graduating senior that participates in Kente. The student who receives the recognition must exemplify high academic achievement, commitment to community service, and advocacy for equity and inclusion on campus.
• The NAACP Award is for one graduating senior that demonstrated achievement in Social Justice and Education. This year’s honoree is active in promoting diversity, inclusion and social justice matters in support of the Black community and racial equity.
• Faculty, staff or administrators at SUNY Cortland who demonstrate support for students of color and are involved in diversity and inclusion initiatives are nominated to receive an honorary Kente stole.

Traditionally from Ghana, the colorful yellow, red, green and black cloth offers students a connection to a rich African academic heritage. Often parents and friends travel long distances in April to participate in their graduate’s big day of hugs, pictures and warm memories. In May, seniors of all ethnic backgrounds proudly also wear their Kente stoles during Commencement.

“The Kente Celebration has a deep institutional history and is an important experience for our multicultural students,” said AnnaMaria Omilanowicz, director of the university’s Multicultural Life and Diversity and Kente Committee chair.

For more information, contact Multicultural Life and Diversity at multicultural.life@cortland.edu.

It’s coming. And it’s big.

The Big Event, a student-run, communitywide civic-engagement project will take place on Sunday, April13.

With a total of 323 student volunteers signed up to participate, registration allowing organizers to match groups with the 44 identified job sites ends today. However, both volunteers and sites will continue to be accepted, and both numbers are expected to grow, according to Eve Cisneros, event coordinator for the Student Government Association.

The university’s Student Government Association (SGA) is once again organizing the event, which became a Cortland tradition in 2015 by sending hundreds of SUNY Cortland students out into the Cortland community, cleaning, raking, painting and otherwise sprucing up a mix of private residences and businesses in their town.

The Big Event is the SGA’s largest annual initiative.

“The Big Event is important to SUNY Cortland because it allows us to build bridges between the university and the community,” Cisneros said. “It is important to me because volunteer work is something I hold close to my heart and will always encourage others to do.

On April 13, volunteers should check in at Park Center Alumni Arena between 9 and 9:30 a.m., where there will be a light continental breakfast. Participants will then organize into groups and depart for work sites through their own transportation at 9:45 a.m. The Big Event will run through 3 p.m.

Volunteer work may include raking leaves, cleaning up trash, painting, gardening or any other requests SGA receives from community members.

Volunteers do not need to bring their own equipment. SGA will supply tools, as will individual work sites.

Members of Greek organizations, student clubs, athletic teams and club sports is are once again committing to the annual initiative, Cisneros said. However, many interested students without any group affiliations have also signed up.

Founded at SUNY Cortland by Ashlee Prewitt ’14, the student club Actively Involved in the Community (AIC) was previously responsible for organizing this event each spring. More than 400 volunteers participated in The Big Event's 2015 Cortland debut.

The university’s first-ever all-SUNY-Cortland TEDx event is coming up, and you don’t want to miss it.

TEDx SUNY Cortland 2025 is scheduled for 6 to 8 p.m. on Friday, April 4, in Sperry Center Vittor Lecture Hall (Room 205).

For the first time in its three-year run, TEDx SUNY Cortland will offer a roster of speakers made up entirely of members of the SUNY Cortland community.

The eight-person lineup includes three Red Dragon alumni, two students, two faculty members and a member of the SUNY Cortland College Council.

“This year's TEDx SUNY Cortland showcases the truly exceptional educational opportunities our institution provides,” said Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Ann McClellan, a member of Cortland’s TEDx coordinating committee.

This year’s event has adopted the theme of the university’s academic yearlong series organized by the Cultural and Intellectual Climate Committee: “Air.” The speakers will explore the invisible forces affecting our lives and share their perspective.

To learn more about TEDx SUNY Cortland and register to attend, visit the event website.

The speakers and presentations for this spring’s event are:

Riley Meckley

SUNY Cortland senior
What Influencers Don’t Want You to Know”

Social media surrounds us like the air we breathe, unseen but constant. As an influencer with more than 173,000 Instagram followers, Meckley will share her experience creating content and discuss its impact on the digital air we live in. The big idea is that social media is polluted with an unrealistic standard of perfection. People are craving authenticity, and her account has been successful by being that ‘breath of fresh air.’  

Jason Page '08, M '12

Alum and Assistant professor in SUNY Cortland’s Recreation, Parks and Leisure Studies Department 

• “Airing Leisure’s Dirty Laundry”

Leisure simultaneously socializes and reinforces power structures. This presentation reveals who benefits and who faces exclusion from leisure opportunities. It confronts uncomfortable truths about privilege and access and sparks vital conversations that can deepen our understanding of leisure and promote inclusivity. 

Kathy Love '91

• SUNY Cortland alum, author, self-care coach and chief community officer of the Outlier Project
• “Self-Care is in the Air”
• Self-care isn’t just manicures and massages. It’s about developing a true connection to yourself so that you know what you need, what you want, and deeply know that you are worth having that. Self-care is the air we all need to breathe. It’s not just about helping ourselves; it changes how we show up for our families, our communities, and yes, the world.

Curtis Czarniak ’89

• “Air and Public Education: Lessons in Complacency”

• The toxic individualism and isolation that permeates all our schools threaten our students and teachers. After a century of educational research, classroom practice and reforms, we must accept the reality that the way we conduct education in our schools IS the problem. That can, and must, change. 

Thomas Curty

SUNY Cortland senior 

• “Let us Breathe”

The topic describes Curty’s personal struggles with mental health and his experiences both before and after therapy. He makes an analogy of respiration and connecting the soul, where being unable to breathe prevents people from living, ultimately creating a discussion about destigmatizing mental health and allocating resources to those who need it. 

Margaret Steffie ’20

SUNY Cortland alum and health and wellness director of Ithaca and Tompkins County YMCA 

• “Breathing New Life into Health: The Power of Knowledge and Nutrition”

Imagine a world where the air is stagnant, with no fresh breeze to clear the fog. That’s where our health is today. Despite new research, outdated ideas about nutrition and health persist, leaving millions confused. It’s time for a fresh breeze of knowledge to circulate, empowering us to reclaim our health and transform the future. 

Rodney Koch

Full-time lecturer in SUNY Cortland’s Computer Applications Program

“Breathing Fresh Skills: Reimagining Workforce Sustainability in the AI Age”

We enter the workforce like fresh air, supported by the oxygen of training and mentoring. Over time, without reskilling, we risk stagnating and becoming released into the air like polluted by-products. By embracing lifelong learning, we can retain our freshness, ensuring adaptability and employability throughout our careers.

Liz Arnold

Cortland College Council board member and founder of Digital Orchards, a career coaching firm serving the tech sector

• “From Air to Action: Why We Need Community Engagement”

The ancient Greeks believed that ideas came via the whispers of muses in our ears. Arnold will explore how the whisper of an idea moves to a small group conversation and then to a full-blown action plan engaging the community. Encouraging this spirit within us will build better civic relationships and combat the epidemic of loneliness in our country.

SUNY Cortland’s annual TEDx conference seeks to bring together a handful of inspiring and visionary thinkers made up of faculty, staff, students, alumni and the surrounding Upstate New York regions for an evening of shared ideas. The inaugural TEDx SUNY Cortland debuted in the spring of 2023. 

SUNY Cortland will wrap up its celebration of Women’s History Month (WHM) through April 9 with a series of events that includes historical and cultural lectures, sandwich seminars and a more earth-friendly look at one essential aspect of being a woman.

For the remainder of February, WHM campus events will be posted online on the news website, in campus Bulletin, on the campus calendar and message screens. Events are free and open to the public.

This year’s theme, “Moving Forward Together! Women Educating & Inspiring Generations,” is based on the National Women’s History Alliance and spotlights the contributions women have made to the American educational system, the free marketplace of ideas and the very fabric of our democracy.

“This theme celebrates the collective strength and influence of women who have dedicated their lives to education, mentorship, and leadership,” said Jessica Carrick-Hagenbarth, associate professor of economics, who organized the WHM events with Bekeh Ukelina, professor of history and Africana studies and director of the Center for Gender and Intercultural Studies; and Anisha Saxena, assistant professor of history.

From classrooms to boardrooms, and from grassroots movements to global initiatives, women educators and leaders have played a pivotal role in nurturing minds and inspiring transformative action.

“Through their efforts, they have served as an inspiration for all generations — both past and present,” Carrick-Hagenbarth said. “Throughout history, the process of information sharing has been a powerful catalyst for change. An honest, open examination of new insights and knowledge can create a framework for collaboration. This, in turn, promotes the well-being of groups, businesses, communities and society as a whole.”

Still to come include:

Tuesday, March 25

Roundtable: “Girls Online:  An Investigation of the Creepypasta Phenomenon from Slenderman to ‘We’re All Going to the World’s Fair,’ and ‘Host’”

Moderator Caroline K. Kaltefleiter will join a panel of communication, media and cinema studies students to discuss how the digital age ushered in a new era of cultural phenomena, with the internet serving as a breeding ground for the proliferation of viral content and the emergence of unique subcultures. That includes the “creepypasta” culture, which refers to the online phenomenon of user-generated, horror-themed short stories or urban legends that are shared and spread across the internet (Brennan, 2015). Panelists will give short presentations to give context to a historical trajectory of the creepypasta phenomenon as grounded in the films “We’re All Going to the World’s Fair” and “Host.” Both films explore the incorporation of new media into digital livelihoods that illuminate a (re)structuring of socialization, particularly among teen girls. The panel will begin at 4:30 p.m. in Sperry Center Hobson Lecture Hall (Room 105).

Wednesday, March 26

Sandwich Seminar: “Devadasi Reform Movement in India”

In India, a devadasi is a female artist who is dedicated to the worship and service of a deity or a temple for the rest of her life. The dedication ceremony is somewhat similar to a marriage. In addition to taking care of the temple and performing rituals, these women also learn and practice classical Indian dances. Professor R. Mahalakshmi will give the presentation on this important movement in India. She serves at the Centre for Historical Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India, and is the sectional president of ancient India with the Indian History Congress. The seminar runs from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. in Old Main Colloquium.

Thursday, March 27

 Sandwich Seminar/Roundtable: “Women Leaders in Higher Education”

 SUNY Cortland assistant registrars Lisa Kennedy and Kristen Dushko will offer their stories, thoughts and suggestions regarding women trying to scale the ivory tower, from noon to 1 p.m. in Old Main Colloquium.

Wednesday, April  9

Tabling Events: “Period.”

Health and Wellness Promotion, Sustainability Office and Conley Wellness peer educators will be on hand from 1 to 3 p.m. in Neubig Hall lobby to inform campus community members about menstrual health and sustainability. We will explore eco-friendly period products, break stigmas and promote well-being for a healthier planet and body. Free period cups will be given away. Contact is health educator Lauren Scagnelli.

Art — as seen through the eyes of schoolchildren and their art teachers — is being presented at an exhibition at SUNY Cortland’s Dowd Gallery that started on Monday, March 24.

Selected by 20 dedicated educators of fine art, student works representing high achievement in the various techniques of drawing, painting, ceramics, collages, sculpture, digital media and creative arts will be displayed throughout the gallery.

Curated in a partnership with regional art teachers, the exhibition, titled “Imagination Celebration,” will run through Saturday, April 5.

Two opening receptions, first for elementary students and later for secondary students, will be held on Thursday, March 27, in the gallery, located in the Dowd Fine Arts Center at the corner of Prospect Terrace and Graham Avenue. The elementary student reception will take place from 5 to 6 p.m. The secondary student reception will run from 6:30 to 7 p.m.

Both receptions will feature music by the Cortland High School Modern Rock Band and other high schools.

A First Friday event on Friday, April 4, will extend gallery hours until 8 p.m. The exhibition and related events are free and open to the public.

Showcasing the work of both student artists and their mentors, “Imagination Celebration” will include students and teachers from area school districts.

Logo designed by Jesse Bender, a Cortland High School teacher

This year, Elizabeth Moshkowski of the Cortland District and Brookley Abbate of Homer Schools are the key organizers with Dowd Gallery. The exhibition will feature student artwork alongside a piece by each student’s educator-mentor.

“Dowd Gallery is excited to collaborate with regional teachers for the 2025 exhibition of elementary and secondary student work in an explosion of color, texture and talent,” said gallery director Scott Oldfield.

The exhibition, with its long tradition of being hosted at the Homer Center for the Arts for many years and then utilizing Homer’s HTEC building in more recent years, came to Dowd Gallery last year for the first time.

“We encourage all to join us in the celebration of fine art and education in the recognition and promotion of creativity in the scholarly pursuit of young artists,” Oldfield said.

Gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and by appointment. Walk-ins are welcome. Visit the Dowd Gallery website for details about exhibiting artists, other programs, safety protocols and online booking. To schedule a visit or arrange group tours, contact Dowd Gallery.