SUNY Fredonia’s volunteer impact throughout Chautauqua County is well known, with approximately 13,000 student volunteer hours contributed annually. Now, thanks to the creation of the Fredonia Academic Community Engagement (FACE) Center, traditional volunteering at SUNY Fredonia is poised to evolve into more strategic, long-lasting and meaningful experiences for both students and community members alike.

University officials are so excited about the FACE Center’s potential to richly benefit students and the region that President Dennis Hefner identified it among 10 high-profile achievements in his January “All-campus Address.”

Civic engagement, sustainability, service learning and community-based research are the four pillars that comprise the FACE Center, whose overall mission is to promote greater collaboration between the campus and community. Pooling them under the new FACE Center banner strengthens their interconnectedness without compromising the ability of each to make specific contributions that respond to specific needs.

Four veteran faculty members — Political Science Chair David Rankin, English Professors Christina Jarvis and Emily Van Dette, and Chemistry Professor Sherri Mason — have been enlisted to manage the FACE Center in its initial year.  Each brings his/her own expertise to the organization, yet they all share a common passion to strengthen the campus-community network.  With more than 30 years of combined teaching experience at SUNY Fredonia alone, the quartet knows the university and the region well.

In past years, individual professors have incorporated certain service learning components into their coursework. Numerous faculty members conduct meaningful research in the surrounding community. Campus-wide activities such as Earth Week and youth voter mobilization have been notable successes with significant student involvement and leadership. But there was never any formal structure to align all four initiatives, explained Vice President for Academic Affairs Virginia Horvath.