Campaign Video Transcipt
Values and Visions seems to be just the right phrase to use to capture what we want this campaign to be about. Alvernia is a very special place to anybody who’s come to know it. I believe Alvernia is poised to really move to the next level in a very dramatic way. Alvernia is a place of great hope.
Giving back to our local community is one of those values that is part of who we are. Everything that I learned here molded me into the person that I am today. And so, I can’t even imagine what my life would have been like if I hadn’t been at Alvernia.
I believe that education is one of the few ways up the ladder. And I believe Alvernia provides an outstanding opportunity for many students. Alvernia has truly come of age. And most recently the initiation of a new Ph.D. program and the explosion of graduate education made people aware of the fact that this once tiny little place on the hill outside of Reading is really now a thriving contemporary university.
The faculty themselves feel there is something different and unique about the college, and this idea of service—they are not here just to have a job—they are here to be of service to the students. It’s a very service-based school and I’m very glad it is because it gives you a whole different perspective on life. Servicing the community makes you feel good about yourself and it’s good getting out there and helping other people. I think faculty are our strongest allies in terms of promoting mission. That is why Alvernia was founded and that is really the whole focus for our educational process.
Our vision for the future is really what is inspiring this campaign in the same way that Sister Zygmunta fifty years ago had great vision for this institution when she boldly helped get it started. That included the creation of a campus Master plan, and also the creation of a strategic plan. It also led naturally to the creation of the comprehensive campaign that we’re now about to launch.
One of our key goals is to really transform the campus into a more residential environment. We’re very aware of the fact that about half of our student body right now is between the ages of 18 to 22 and they have certainly some very distinct needs. But we also have a lot of adult students, working adults, the other half of our campus, and of course, we have an additional 600 seniors.
We have the Centers for Excellence, the Center for Community Engagement, a Center for Ethics and Leadership, and those centers will be stronger and better able to provide services to the community because of this campaign.
We are looking at improvements in infrastructure for recreation and wellness; we’re looking at restoring and renovating our most historic and significant building in Francis Hall. When I came here in 1961, Francis Hall was the college. Everything was here: administration; students; classrooms; all in this building. That is why we want to preserve it because it is the historical center of the college.
That giant parking lot between the student center and the dorms is such a classic place for a quad—where students can study and sit on benches and work and throw a Frisbee. I think that is incredibly valuable.
We’re also going to be building a new recreation center, and that serves all students, alums and faculty. Whether it be recreational and wellness programming or actually for the intercollegiate athletics. We also have some other complexes that we’re building with a softball and baseball stadium.
I am particularly excited about the expansion of the facility to add a track, to improve the tennis courts and to provide a competitive environment for the students—and also a very attractive and useful environment for the community because Alvernia shares itself with the community.
One of the exciting things that we hope to develop in the future is a stronger commitment to the fine and performing arts—more classroom space, performance space, gallery space.
The physical transformation of the campus is certainly the thing that most people notice very quickly. But I’d want to emphasize equally the investment we want to make in our faculty and in our academic programs, so we significantly improve the quality of education that students of all ages receive.
It’s coming together, we’re seizing opportunities—you can really see that dollar contribution you make as being a direct correlation to the return to the students and to the community as a whole. It’s an exciting time to be associated with Alvernia.
The educational quality at Alvernia is something that is so critically important to the businesses that comprise our community. An investment in Alvernia is positively, absolutely, unequivocally an investment in Berks County.
We are recognizing now and especially given the arrival of the 50th anniversary and the Capital Campaign that Alvernia is, maybe for the first time, standing on its own as an institution. And now we are offering as much back to those who created us as they are offering to us.
We are riding a wave of success. We want people to join us in that success. We want people to see the value that Alvernia brings to this community continue to make that investment because we know that from here we can go even farther.
Every time I leave a Board of Trustees meeting or sit through a class as an observer, I come away with that perspective of the values that are ingrained in somebody that graduates from Alvernia. To Learn, To Love and To Serve.
Alvernia really is my home. When I look around at the campus, how it has changed and evolved over the years, it’s as if I’m a proud owner of a home looking at how the house has been fixed-up over the years. For Alvernia, we can continue to offer something that maybe students can’t find elsewhere, or haven’t been given elsewhere, or have not discovered in the ways that they have been up until the time they come.
Alvernia is the only place that I’ve ever lived, that when I return back to it, I feel like I’m going home. The definition of love is a feeling of returning home and that’s what I get with Alvernia.
