The High Road Runs Through the City
August 15, 2011 7:45 AM BUFFALO RISING ONLINE
By Queens Eye
View Original Article
We all know how nice it is to have so many collegiate institutions in the region, especially since the advent of Service Learning programs. There is one university that’s located 150 miles away that should also get some credit for lending a hand to our grassroots organizations.
This summer, Cornell University offered its students a Service Learning and Action Research program called The High Road Runs Through the City/ The program teamed students up with local organizations affiliated with Partnership for Public Good. The goal was to immerse the students into hands-on learning roles that would lend helping hands (and brains) to ongoing urban revitalization efforts. “The High Road Fellowship is a unique program among other higher education service-learning experiences and externships. The Fellowship is a summer long immersion that promotes service and leadership in community affairs and policy-oriented scholarship,” said program coordinator, Megan Connelly.
For the third year, Cornell students took on the same challenges that our own community activists do on an ongoing basis. A handful of the High Road Fellows even took up residency in PUSH’s NetZero House, learning the ins and outs of living a sustainable existence. The Buffalo-Cornell partnership continues to grow from year to year, attracting students from as far away as California. It is these types of relationships that help to foster change within our city, and at the same time Buffalo can be proud that it is able to offer itself up as a living laboratory thanks to the progressive organizations that have taken root over the last decade.
Students participating in High Road Fellowship and their partner agencies are:
Derya Akbaba ’13, Urban Roots
Jeffrey Baker ’14, Partnership for the Public Good
Daniel Cooper ’13, Buffalo First
Susanne Donovan ’13, Daemen College Center for Sustainable Communities
Abhishek Gupta ’10, MS ’11, International Institute
David Huang ’13, Coalition for Economic Justice
Sahil Jain ’14, Prisoners are People Too
Elizabeth Li ’13, Clean Air Coalition
Alyssa Murrett ’13, Public Accountability Initiative, Partnership for the Public Good
John Parker ’12, PUSH Buffalo
Lauren Schwarzenholzer ’13, Partnership for the Public Good
Elizabeth Spivak ’13, Everywoman Opportunity Center
Andrea Thomas ’12, Heart of the City Neighborhoods
Tom Wasko ’14, Buffalo CarShare