Veritas, Vol. 33, No. 03, December 1992-January 1993

              For the Faculty and Staff of the University of Miami	December 1992/January 1993 Volume 33 Number 3
Smathers gives $10 million for wellness center
Senator George
Between the first and second quarters of what would turn out to be a winning homecoming football game against Temple in the Orange Bowl, former U.S. Senator George A.
Smathers brought another bright spot to the day: his announcement of a $10 million commitment to the University of Miami.
Smathers’ gift will provide money to support and maintain a proposed student recreation and wellness center on the Coral Gables campus.
The multimillion dollar center, scheduled for completion in early 1995, will be named The George A. Smathers Center.
“I have lived most of my life in Miami, and the city and the people have been good to me,” says Smathers. “The University of Miami has added much to South Florida, and I would like to encourage the University to move forward in its endeavor to provide learning and improvement to all young people both mentally and physically. The George A. Smathers Center is my chance to help the
students as well as the University.” The 110,000 square-foot center will include indoor and outdoor sports facilities and a “wellness center,” featuring classrooms, an instructional kitchen, and a fitness testing area.
“We are extremely grateful for
Senator Smathers’ generosity,” said President Edward T. Foote n, who presented Smathers with an Order of Merit award, UM’s highest honor. “His commitment to higher education in this state is commendable. We are honored to have his support.”
Smathers represented Florida in Washington for 22 years as a representative and a senator. He was a freshman congressman with both John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon and became a friend to both men. Smathers retired from the Senate in 1969.
Last year Smathers gave his alma mater, the University of Florida, $20 million to develop the school’s library system, which was renamed in his honor. It was the largest private donation ever given to a state educational institution in Florida.
“Senator Smathers’
$10 million planned gift to the University of Miami is a great boost to our fundraising efforts,” says Roy J. Nirschel, Jr., vice president for University Advancement. “His gift in support of our students will enhance our planned health and recreation facility.”
Smathers’ brother, Frank, is a member of the UM Board of Trustees.
Former U.S. Senator George Smathers is presented with the Order of Merit award by Charles E. Cobb, Jr., chairman of the Board of Trustees, and President Edward T. Foote II after the announcement was made of Smathers’ generous gift to the University of Miami during the homecoming football game.
Volunteerism gives students valuable lessons in life
Shortly after Hurricane Andrew struck, the president of the the Charleston, South Carolina, Chamber of Commerce came to Miami and was interviewed on the radio.
“One of the things you will learn from this down the line,” he said, “is to understand hunger and homelessness firsthand. Your community will never tolerate it again.”
Those words already ring true in Miami as they did in Charleston after Hurricane Hugo. If there was any good to come out of the tragedy of Hurricane Andrew, it was the miraculous joining of hands across the county to help a community in need. Nowhere was this more evident than at the University of Miami, where more than 350 students contacted the Volunteer Services Center to offer their help.
Craig Ullom, director of Student Life, hopes these volunteer efforts will continue beyond the scope of the hurricane and eventually become integrated into the University’s curriculum.
“We need to build a bridge between the students and the volunteer opportunities in the community,” he says.
“We want to help them understand the reason this type of work is necessary by looking at the issues behind the problems—what is homelessness? what can be done about it?—and connect what we have learned in the classroom with practice and reality. That makes for a much more powerful and dynamic learning experience that will cause students to take positive social actions as they move on from the University.”
This has already been taking place gradually across the University: architecture students are designing a Florida-style house for Habitat for Humanity and will help build it the following semester, medical and nursing students are taking care of migrant workers at clinics in South Dade, education students are working with youth in a literacy enhancement project, sociology students are being placed in community agencies, and business students are developing marketing strategies for non-profit organizations.
“Already we’re seeing a student body that is operating more from altruism than any group we’ve seen in
recent years,” says John Masterson, vice provost for undergraduate affairs, who is working with Ullom and Carrie Edmondson, director of the Volunteer Services Center, to explore service learning as an instructional strategy. “Now with the increased visibility of community need, I think we can move forward and provide students and faculty an outlet for altruism by providing service to the community.” Last month all faculty members were invited to a workshop to discuss opportunities for volunteer service, service learning, and the resources available to the faculty through the new Instructional Advancement Center.
“We’re beginning a process of helping faculty members understand how what they teach can relate to the larger world,” says Ullom. “Faculty members are always looking for ways they can enrich the learning experience in the classroom. Nothing excites them more than to see interested students. It’s a win, win, win situation—it benefits the students, the faculty, and the community.”
As director of the Volunteer Services Center, Carrie Edmondson acts as a
liaison between professors and some 300 agencies with which she is in contact.
“I try to make it as easy as possible for professors to incorporate service learning into their classes,” says Edmondson, who made that a goal when she became director last year. “I’ve taken professors with me to visit agencies and to conduct site visits so they will realize this is a valuable experience worthy of classroom credits.”
Masterson views service learning as part of what a university is about—to give students an opportunity to serve their communities, to see how good it feels to do that, and to begin to build a lifelong habit of doing so.
“As educators, our focus has to be at least in part on what we’re doing for our students,” he says. “Are we truly preparing them to be the citizens that we expect college graduates to be? Service has always been the expectation of faculty members. I’d like to see a culture that expects the same service from its students.”
—Susan May