Alumni Profile: Robby Callahan Schreiber
Welcome to our Alumni Profile series. Each month we’ll catch up with a HECUA alumni, and see how their time in a HECUA classroom influenced their career goals, their life in the community, and their pursuit of continued education. If you or a friend would like to participate in this series, please email [email protected]. This dispatch comes from Emily Seru, HECUA's Manager of Internships and Community Partnerships.
In 2003, Robby Callahan Schreiber was attending Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota. Through his involvement with the student led outdoor education programs, he...
#WerkitWednesday Office Dispatch
As close followers of the HECUA twitter account (@hecua_offcampus) know, each Wednesday we dedicate our stream to tweeting and re-tweeting job opportunities. We add a #werkitwednesday to the end of each job-related tweet so that our friends, fans and followers can easily supplement their professional searches. This is one of the most popular subjects on our twitter account, so hopefully it’s helpful to some of you folks!
This month we’re adding a new feature: a periodic #werkitwednesday blog post. We’d like to offer you a glimpse into the life of a non-profit office: our ongoing efforts to...
What IS the HECUA Community Gathering?
What is a Community Gathering, and why is it such an important part of the HECUA semester?
Although HECUA’s domestic off-campus study programs share a home base in the Twin Cities (with the notable exception of Race in America, which travels across four southern states), the classes have limited overlap over the course of the semester. They may come together for a session or two, or enjoy a joint field visit to a site of mutual interest, but for the most part the divergent subject matter keeps HECUA students well occupied in their own classrooms. That separation is one of the reasons why our...
Economic justice means increased access to capital for immigrant farmers: recommendations from Agriculture and Justice student Rafika Momin.
Rafika Momin is an Economics major at the University of Minnesota, currently enrolled in HECUA's part-time Agriculture and Justice program. Rafika chose to add the optional internship component to this off-campus study program, and when the semester ends, she'll have completed more than 160 hours of work at local non-profit African Economic Development Solutions. Her work with AEDS has led her to powerful conclusions about the potential for economic development in immigrant farming communities. Read on for Rafika's take on how increased demand for communty-specific "specialty crops" could be...
Not a Building, but a Movement. - A HECUA student reflects on the fire at the headquarters of Neighborhoods Organizing for Change.
A current HECUA student wrote this moving reflection on the fire at the Neighborhoods Organizing for Change headquarters (NOC), and generously allowed us to share their words. You can find more information about NOC here, and if you are moved to donate after reading this piece, you can do so here.
"This past week has been a monumental experience for me, as for many other people too I imagine. On Wednesday, April 15th, the day of our national protest , NOC's office was burned down along with its recently purchased Lenovo desktops and monitors, cell phones, brand-new leather office chairs, the...
Art makes spaces that belong to US. - Cora at Patrick's Cabaret.
Cora Neisen is a sophomore at the University of Minnesota, majoring in Strategic Communications and minoring in Spanish. She spent the fall of 2014 enrolled in HECUA's Writing for Social Change class, and is now a Student Advisor for HECUA, guiding her peers at the University of Minnesota through the HECUA application process. Cora completed her HECUA internship at Patrick's Cabaret in the winter, and was promptly invited to join their staff as a part-time employee. She wrote this short piece for us about what it took to find a community at Patrick's, and what that hard-won feeling of...
"Why are you going to burn it down?" - Eileen's internship at the Temple in Northern Ireland
Eileen McNulty is a St. Olaf College student, a Studio Art and History major currently enrolled in HECUA's Northern Ireland: Democracy and Social Change program. All of the HECUA programs abroad include a significant internship component, placing students with a local organization for the better part of the semester. Eileen's internship placement with the Waterside Neighbourhood Partnership meant that she spent a good deal of time working on the construction of Californian artist David Best's Temple installation, a massive structure designed to be consumed by fire. Eileen offers her story of...
"Sign me up!" - Beth Olson's experience with zAmya Theater Project
Beth Olson is a rising senior in the University of Minnesota's Family Social Science program, and a current student in HECUA's Inequality in America off-campus study program. She's spent the past few months interning with St. Stephen's Human Services zAmya Theater Project, "a unique creative process that brings together homeless and housed individuals to create and perform a theatrical production," and an amazing component of St. Stephen's Community Outreach. Working at zAmya has given Beth a firsthand view of the impact of community created and supported art. She writes below about her...
Alumni Profile: Megan Sheridan and the Sustainable Supper Club
Welcome to our new Alumni Profile series. Each month we’ll catch up with a HECUA alumni, and see how their time in a HECUA classroom influenced their career goals, their life in the community, and their pursuit of continued education. If you or a friend would like to participate in this series, please email [email protected] .
Megan Sheridan and the Sustainable Supper Club at 320 Northeast.
Megan Sheridan (HECUA Environmental Studies 2008) is in the business of narrative. A recovering marketer, she and her husband, Matt, now make their living by hosting weekly ticketed dinners in their home...
A broader view of what's possible: Jordyn's experience in Making Media, Making Change.
In addition to our well-known 16 credit semester long programs in the US and abroad, HECUA offers two tightly focused eight credit classes in Minnesota: Agriculture and Justice and Making Media, Making Change (MMMC).
This is the second year for MMMC, offered in partnership with neighborhood access network SPNN. Students enrolled in the program explore questions of media ownership, access, and strategy, and learn from working artists, activists, videographers and social media experts. They are also given time in SPNN’s production studio to learn (or hone) the skills they need to create stories...
