University Park, Pa. -- As the nation helps the Gulf Coast begin to recover from yet another hurricane, Penn State continues to lend a helping hand. Over the past few weeks, the University community has mobilized to aid relief efforts -- from enrolling displaced college students so that they could get their academic semesters underway to participating in scores of donation drives, blood drives and other charitable events.
As of Wednesday (Sept. 28), the University has enrolled 33 students displaced after Katrina made landfall last month. While more than half are Pennsylvania residents, the students also hail from Louisiana and from northeastern states such as New Jersey and New York. Most are Tulane University students, but others come from the University of New Orleans, Loyola University, Delgado University, Xavier University and Louisiana State University.
While some students are being welcomed into the University fold as an effect of Hurricane Katrina, almost as many Penn State students have temporarily departed on military leave. Approximately 30 Penn State students have been called up officially for National Guard duty to assist in the areas devastated by Hurricane Katrina, and that number is expected to double, according to the University Registrar.
It is unclear yet if the effects of Hurricane Rita will necessitate a longer stay for the deployed students. In any case, the University has procedures in effect to help facilitate these students' smooth transitions back into their academic careers when they return.
Among those most profoundly affected by Hurricane Katrina are seven students from Xavier University in New Orleans who are studying at Penn State this semester as part of a cooperative program between the two institutions. The students shared their stories during a press conference on the University Park campus on Sept. 7. Since then, they have attempted to get on with their lives in State College, a task made even more difficult when Hurricane Rita complicated recovery efforts in New Orleans recently.
Dawn LaFargue, second year Xavier doctoral student in curriculum and instruction from New Orleans, is thankful that her daughter, parents and older brother are now with her in State College, but Hurricane Rita, she said, has added insult to injury.
"As a firefighter, my husband, who has been visiting for the past week, will return to New Orleans next week. Unfortunately, our home in New Orleans has received about three additional feet of water as a result of the levy breech and storm surge from Rita, " said LaFargue. "Yet, we continue to move on."
Driven by a commitment to service and a heartfelt desire to help those in need, the Penn State community has responded to the needs of hurricane victims through a variety of donation drives and charitable events over the past weeks. Some highlights include:
--More than $77,000 contributed by Penn State football fans at the Sept. 10 and 17 home games to aid American Red Cross relief efforts.
-- Penn State's Child Development Laboratory and the Bennett Family Center were able to accommodate the children of two families -- one at each location -- displaced by Hurricane Katrina.
--University Emergency Medical Services (UEMS) of Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center joined a fleet of 80 ambulances and more than 200 providers from across Pennsylvania to assist with medical rescue and recovery efforts around Hurricane Katrina's destruction in the Gulf region.
--Penn State's Applied Research Laboratory collaborated with State College business Rider Auto to organize a donation drive in the days immediately after Katrina made landfall. The drive has resulted in thousands of basic materials being delivered to the Gulf region and still continues until Oct. 14 at the Frank and Sylvia Pasquerilla Spiritual Center on the University Park campus. For more information, see http://live.psu.edu/story/13456
-- Penn State's World Campus, College of Earth and Mineral Science and School of Information Sciences and Technology have joined a Sloan Consortium initiative to offer a condensed online fall semester free of charge to students whose studies were disrupted by Hurricane Katrina. The Sloan Consortium is an international association of colleges and universities committed to quality online education. For more information, see http://live.psu.edu/story/13579
-- Countless offers of personal assistance from Penn Staters, including a professor in the College of Agricultural Sciences who has opened his home to two transfer students for the semester; two Somerset, Pa., alumni, who have offered a fully furnished efficiency apartment to a family looking to relocate due to the hurricane; and an assistant professor of human development and family studies at Penn State Fayette who is taking three weeks leave to provide professional counseling and comfort to the victims of the hurricane.
To learn more about the many other programs and initiatives Penn State has launched in response to Hurricane Katrina, go to http://live.psu.edu/story/13357