By Erik Squire

It’s that time again SMCC; time for more stellar news about our fabulous campus. This edition we will be exploring a bit about Path to Graduation; or as the cool kids call it P2G (I know pretty hip, isn’t it). We will also make our way over to New Orleans (well, mentally anyway) and learn about Intervarsity Christian Fellowship’s service project of rebuilding a place in need.

The Beacon connected with Michele Pavitt who is an advisor and peer-mentor trainer for P2G.

As Ms. Pavitt explains, the program was made possible by a $500,000 donation from Key Bank. It enabled the college to hire two “success coaches,” herself and Kristi Kaeppel, to serve as secondary advisors for SMCC’s cohort of students. (Each student was also assigned a faculty academic advisor.) Pavitt and Kaeppel are both working with about 45 students, who are all first-time, college-ready, full-time, and committed to completing their degrees within two years. Each of the students will receive a $500 scholarship each semester for his or her first three semesters. They are also eligible for a $1,000 scholarship in their final semester, provided that they are on track to graduate. In return, each student has agreed to serve as a peer mentor for one incoming SMCC student next fall. Pavitt and Kaeppel will provide peer-mentor training to prepare the students for this important role.

Keep a heads up SMCC, the program will be expanded from 90 students to approximately 150 students next year.

The Beacon also met with Joel Wentz who is a full time campus staff member for Intervarsity Christian Fellowship (IV).

Two years ago Joel was hired to start an Intervarsity chapter in the Portland area, and that’s when he started SMCC’s chapter. Joel is also an adjunct professor and teaches an Academic Success class here, he oversees other IV chapters in the area, but mainly his time is spent overseeing the SMCC Chapter.

Intervarsity is a faith based non-profit organization. Their goal is to see healthy communities on campuses that encourage spiritual conversation. Joel stated that the question of faith is one of the most important questions we face, and it’s important to address it no matter where we land on it. He believes that IV helps address that question. Though they come at it from a Christian perspective, they try to be open and welcoming to any and all beliefs. Joel also noted that it was a personal goal of his to have people of multiply beliefs present during meetings because, he feels, it enriches the conversation. That being said anybody who wants to hold a leadership position would be expected to be a Christian.

IV meets regularly for bible studies and they also meet once a week to plan community time, where they figure out how to meet new people and how get others involved. For example they’ll hold a table at the campus center or host a movie night; things of that nature. That’s just the regular week-in/week-out stuff.

IV does two big events and they occur during the fall and spring semesters. Every fall they have a retreat/conference in NH. They meet up with other chapters from NH VT, and ME to gather at a camp for a weekend. There’ll be about 150 students who attend this fall.

Then in the spring the biggest thing that Intervarsity does is head down to New Orleans during spring break for a service trip. Joel says it’s a lot of fun and it takes a ton of work but it has been an extremely encouraging program. SMCC’s chapter goes down there with all the other IV chapters in New England. The program lasts a total of 5 weeks to accommodate the different spring break dates that each participating college may have. A bus goes to all the different colleges and picks up students during their break, so a decent mix of students will likely pile on the same bus, and it can be lot of fun.

While there, Intervarsity works with non-profits in the city. As Joel explains “they know a lot better about what needs to be done; rather than us coming in and calling the shots.”

As an example of what IV does, they’ve previously worked with Project Homecoming to renovate houses that had been left vacant for the last 8 years since the hurricane. IV has also worked with another organization named Journey Nine. Journey Nine found that just by repainting houses, the houses become less likely to be noticed by drug dealers and therein are less likely to have drugs sold in them.

Intervarsity has been doing this since Hurricane Katrina hit in 05; it started as a relief project and has carried on to this day. This is something that Joel says he is particularly proud of. He further clarifies: After the media attention dies down the aid starts to leave as well. But the city still needed so much work. In fact before Katrina even hit, New Orleans already needed a lot of help, but the storm sort of exposed what was going in under the surface. So we (Intervarsity) will keep coming back, no matter how long it takes. And we’ve been doing so coming up on nine years.