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Host families needed in Rockland County, NY

By

joanwhitacre

on

Monday, June 16, 2008, 4:05pm

Hello and Happy late spring,

I wanted to inform you about this special program — info below — being initiated at RCC this fall, for your own interest or if you have friends or colleagues who might be interested in hosting. I met with Laurie Pina, the coordinator at Rockland Community College, recently. The program sounds well structured and intense, with an intention to prepare the women participants to make a significant contribution to their home country. A requirement is that they must return home after the two year program.

I have agreed to host a student in my home. This fits quite well with Whole Women Healing's mission to facilitate women's healing and empowerment, and our commitment to join FOR's delegation to Colombia in August, from which I will return to greet my student.

But what is most exciting for Whole Women Healing: we have entered into discussion with Laurie to provide stress reduction, leadership training, and communication skills to these women over the course of their 2 years of residence here, and to engage the women in community service here in the county.

For non-profit organizations, this is an opportunity to involve these students in community service and volunteer activities.

Please consider whether you would like to host one of these women in your home for the coming academic year. The women will reside in host family homes the first year, from mid-August until June '09. And please pass this announcement along to friends and colleagues, and consider whether your non-profit organization could benefit.

And please mark June 26th, 5:30 — 9pm in your schedules as our summer solstice gathering and official goodbye to Sue Bouder, our Assistant Director, upon her move to Orlando, Florida! A notice will go out in the next day.

Thanks very much.

Yours in peace,

Joan

Joan Campbell Whitacre
Executive Director
Whole Women Healing

845-300-8309

Twenty Outstanding International Women Chosen to Study at SUNY Rockland

Host families needed to house students beginning August, 2008

Twenty women from socio-economically disadvantaged communities in Central
America, Mexico and the Caribbean will spend two years advancing their
business careers at SUNY Rockland Community College.

The College has the honor of being selected to participate in the
Cooperative Association of States for Scholarships (CASS) program, which
brings outstanding students from underserved communities in the Dominican
Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico and Nicaragua
to the United States for two years of study, leadership training,
community service and cultural exchange. While in the United States, the
students will be involved in community service activities in the county
and will prepare a community action plan to be implemented upon return to
their home countries.

Rockland Community College has selected twenty female students between
the ages of 18 and 24 who will study small business management. Students
arrive with little or no English language skills and live with host
families for the first year. Host families are given a stipend, in
exchange for providing the student with housing and meals, and are
expected to integrate the student into the life of the family as much as
possible. During the second year, the students transition to apartment
living.

The program is administered by a unique partnership between the U.S.
Agency for International Development (USAID), community-based educational
institutions, and Georgetown University’s Center for Intercultural
Education and Development (CIED).

Students will be arriving in mid-August. Any community member interested
in becoming a host family, please contact:


Laurie Piña, CASS Coordinator
SUNY Rockland Community College
845-574-4586