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CO
NEWS
INSIDE MOREHOUSE, MARCH/APRIL 2012
Follett Higher Education Group
Donates $25,000 for Scholarships
T he Follett Higher Education Group, which runs the Morehouse College
Bookstore, donated $25,000 to the Morehouse College Renaissance Now
campaign for student scholarships on Feb. 2.
Pictured from left to right: Follett Regional Manager Jim Cope; Julie Sills,
Morehouse’s director of Corporate and Foundation Relations; Steve Pribyl,
Follett executive vice president; Ralph Johnson, Morehouse’s chief procure
ment officer and associate vice president for Procurement and Contracts; Follett
President Tom Christopher; Phillip Howard ’87, Morehouse’s vice president for
Institutional Advancement; Howard Taylor, Follett vice president—Eastern Region;
and Cedric Hughes, manager of the Morehouse College Bookstore. ■
Morehouse in Spain Gives Students a
Month of Spanish Culture and Study
M orehouse students can spend a month living in Spain, taking courses and learning
about the Spanish culture.
Patricia Pogal, director of the Morehouse in Spain Program, is looking for students
who want to live and study in Andalucia, Spain, May 12 to June 2.
Students stay with host families (where they sign an oath to only speak Spanish) and
take classes that involve in-class and field study at the University of Cadiz. They also spend
time in Andalucia, a 3,000-year-old city with strong African influences, and other Spanish
towns.
“This is not just about getting the ‘well-traveled’ under their belts,” said Pogal. “It’s an
opportunity to learn the culture, to use the Spanish language day in and day out and build
connections, both personal and potentially business, as well.”
The cost for students is $4,563 but
they earn six academic credits for
participating. The program also is
open to Spelman and Clark Atlanta
students. Students must have com
pleted Spanish 101 or an equivalent.
For more information about the
Morehouse in Spain Program, con
tact Pogal at (404) 759-5244 or a
ppogal@morehouse.edu. ■
Morehouse students participating in the
Morehouse in Spain Program 2011 visited
Jerez de la Frontera during their stay.
Honorable Mention
Brooks Honors Her Mother by Encouraging Kids to Communicate
From left to right: Webster Langhome, (Academy Leader) Center Communication and Journalism; Winfrey
Driver - 3rd Place Winner; Kesi Kmt - 1st Place Winner; Leontis Kirkland - 2nd Place Winner; Bobbie Brooks,
Contest Director
BY ADD SEYMOUR JR.
BOBBIE BROOKS has always loved
children. So when she looked for a
way to honor her late mother, former
teacher Colie Brooks Glenn, it was
pretty easy to figure out what she was
going to do.
In her time away from working as
an audit administrator at Morehouse,
Brooks started the non-profit organiza
tion, Learning and Achievement Matters,
Inc. Her focus is to show high school
students the importance of education and
communication.
“Communication is the No. 1 prior
ity for all of our kids,” said Brooks, whose
only professional communication experi
ence is being a member of Toastmasters
of Atlanta. Toastmasters is a national
organization that encourages communi
cation and leadership development. “If
you can’t communicate, then you can’t
get anywhere,” she said.
She points to the words of Gilbert
Amelio, president and CEO of the
National Semiconductor Corporation:
“Developing excellent communication
skills is absolutely essential to effective
leadership.. .If a leader can’t get a mes
sage across clearly and motivate others to
act on it, then having a message doesn’t
even matter.”
“Everyone can’t be a leader, but those
words apply to everyone,” Brooks said.
Her organization has held a number
of events with young people, includ
ing taking them to educational music
programs, working the Boys Scouts of
America and volunteer work with the
Urban League of Atlanta.
Her priority right now is coordinating
a series of speech contests with five Atlanta
high schools. Students are given a topic in
which they have to do research and their
ownwnting. After committing a speech to
memory, they present in front of a panel
of judges that Brooks brought together.
Winners are awarded monetary prizes.
The first contest was held at Douglass
High School in February. Other contests
will be held in late March at the New
Schools of Carver, South Atlanta High
School, Maynard Jackson High School and
Washington High School.
“You really don’t know what kind of
impact you can have on these children,”
Brooks said. “Something as small as a
speech contest can bring out the best in
them and help them to understand how
important communication is.”
Brooks hopes to extend her organi
zation’s work to adults. But right now,
she’s proud of her work and being able to
watch hundreds of students grow men
tally and spiritually.
And she believes her mother
would have been proud.
“She would have been at every
event,” Brooks said. “She loved kids.” ■
Healthier Lives
(Continued from Page 1)
There, local farmers and vendors bring their
produce to campus for students, faculty and staff
to purchase. Food preparers from the West End
community are on hand to teach how to prepare
fresh food that is also tasty.
“It makes it easy for them to be able to get
healthy items,” added Baird, MRI’s grant special
ist. “They don’t have to go to the grocery store.
They can go to the Farmer’s Market and get things
they need. And for students who don’t live in the
Suites where there are kitchens, they can get fruit
that they can keep in their refrigerators.”
Added Pattern: “Part of the strategy is to get
folks a little more aware of their nutritional needs,
but also to get them access to fresh produce so
they can take it home and prepare it and get more
of an idea about changing their behaviors in terms
of what they are eating.”
Other MRI events include periodically provid
ing free haircuts at Statz Barber Shop on campus
for students who take advantage of free health
screenings, and encouraging faculty and staff to
be aware of men’s health issues by wearing blue on
certain days throughout March.
Away from campus, the MRI works with high
school students and adult men throughout the
community. Every other Monday since January,
they’ve gone to the Mexican consulate offices to
provide free health screenings for Hispanic males.
All those things are about encouraging men to
five healthier, Patton explained.
That s also been one of our major charges — to
get men information so they’ll at least have some fac
tual information to understand their own health and
to make them understand that getting screenings,
eating healthier and just taking care of themselves is
not as bad as they may think they are.” ■