At noon today, members of the development staff (left to right: Mary Clare Monahan, Billy Joe Jayne, Andi Lippincott, and Kathy Dean) led by Executive Vice President Carolanne Marquis (below, center) rang the Ball Hall bell in celebration of the College receiving the Kresge Foundation Challenge Grant.
We did it!
The College has met the requirements set by the Kresge Foundation to receive a $600,000 challenge grant for The Campaign to Save Ball Hall.
Counting the Kresge funds, the campaign total stands at $10,492,838. The goal was $10 million.
“The Kresge Challenge was all about increasing participation in the campaign and we certainly did that,” said College President Joseph G. Burke.
The Office of Development reports that 2,466 gifts have been made to the campaign.
Faculty and staff came through in a big way; 215 of them contributed $106,110, nearly double the projection for dollars raised.
“I want to thank all of our supporters—alumni, faculty, staff, parents, trustees, foundations, corporations, and friends—for helping us meet the Kresge Challenge,” said the president, “and I hope everyone will come out and help us celebrate the completion of the campaign and renovation June 14.”
The impact of meeting the Kresge Challenge could be felt long after Reunion Weekend, however.
“We have positioned ourselves well to receive future grants from the Kresge Foundation and because we have added to our giving base, we will be better able to take advantage of opportunities to help the College in the years ahead,” said Burke.
The folks over at our Accelerated Studies for Adults Program had a pumpkin carving contest today. My vote goes to this one, crafted by Anne Killen, director of administrative services and Gail Roberts, director/associate professor of Social Work. They call it The Ghost of George Harvey Ball.
- Pete
A guest entry from Gretchen Parsells, manager of communications:
As the last couple of days of summer give way to fall, I have mixed emotions. I love summer at Keuka College, and the freedom it gives me to eat my lunch on top of the boathouse, or picnic-style on the chapel lawn. The lake is so pretty when it is blue, and the trees are a flurry of activity as the squirrels and birds vie for nest space. The smell of freshly mown grass mixes with a hint of rain, and we furiously click the “save” icon on our computers as we hear the first rumblings of thunder. But fall at Keuka brings its own beauty, as the leaves turn from green to brilliant shades of red, orange and yellow. The crisp, cool mornings make me look forward to a hot cup of Dark Magic Espresso coffee from the Terrace Café, while the warm, sunny afternoons encourage me to be outside as long as it stays light. Fall also brings families near and far to campus for Family Weekend. A weekend bustling with activities, beginning tomorrow, Friday, Sept. 21, there are events and activities for all members of the family. While most of the weekends’ activities occur Saturday, other events will be tomorrow and Sunday. Some of the events include Keuka’s cheerleaders, dance and step teams showcasing their skills tomorrow night, while Saturday, President Burke will update parents and students alike with projects and activities on campus, and the Viking Spirit will head out for tours of Keuka Lake twice. Family Weekend also bring out friendly competition as students, families, alumni, faculty and staff climb into the College’s canoes for the annual Shively Cup canoe and kayak races. Two athletes and a former coach will be inducted into the Athletics Hall of Fame, the volleyball team will triumph over visiting Morrisville College (my prediction), and there will be activities geared toward children ages 5-12 sponsored by the Education Club. Sunday features men’s and women’s alumni soccer games, and First Annual Ed Purcell Alumni Classic (lacrosse). I will be here all day Saturday to document events photographically, as well as assist in any way I am able. I look forward to meeting the families who come this weekend, and invite those of you who have not seen the renovations in Ball Hall to stop in, say hello, and take a tour of the ground and first floors.
I had the pleasure of driving a golf cart during reunion weekend, picking up reunion attendees — alumni and their family members — and dropping them off at their destinations. Not only was driving the cart for the first time a hoot, but I enjoyed hearing about the Keuka College of days gone by from my passengers and fellow alumni. Stories about Ball Hall were of great interest since I work in the building. Two women, graduates from the ’70s or ’80s, I’m guessing, said they used to watch soap operas in the basement, where the communications office is now located. I believe they also mentioned something about smoking, too, but their words started to trail off…
Visiting the memory room set up on the first floor in Ball was also a delight. That’s where Inez Potwin Brumm ‘52 shared with me her photos and memories of living in Ball Hall. She resided in a second floor room with two roommates. The room had a single bed and bunk beds and the young women agreed to switch beds every 10 weeks, providing each of them some time in the single bed. How great that they were able to reach such a compromise.
Reading through the Ball Hall memories that other alumni jotted down in the memory room provided a glimpse of the building throughout the decades. Judy Hart Bode’s ‘ 62 entry recounting “sliding down the main stairway on an old mattress” made me realize that students back then could be just as inventive with their entertainment as students today. Sandy Kirkpatrick Rozek’s ‘62 furthers that notion. “Can you get in trouble for ‘borrowing’ pitchers of ice from the kitchen in the middle of the night?” she asks. “Just another of those quirky things in Ball Hall — access to anywhere, anytime — just so long as we didn’t go through the outside doors!” Jill Martin ‘77 recalls taking a sailing class from Mrs. Africa. “We had to keep a record of the wind and the waves on the Beaumont Scale and we would do it by looking out the windows at the lake,” she writes. Laura David Chaba ‘82 wonders if “George” was responsible for standing a pencil upright and “moving it across a sheet of paper” while she was visiting some friends on the third floor. Good question.
Thanks to everyone who shared her or his Keuka memories during reunion. Don’t forget you can also relate those recollections here, in the “Ball Hall Memories” section. I enjoyed meeting so many of you over the weekend.
-Tanya
Summer hasn’t officially started yet, but already we’ve had some beautiful, warm weather in Keuka Park. And warm is good, if you ask me. But, when you’re cooped up in a building that is being renovated and therefore are not able to open windows because brick work is being done on the exterior, it helps to have air conditioning. Ball Hall now has central air! When the renovation was going on last summer, the window air conditioning units had to be removed and the windows had to remain shut. I will confess that at times the air is a bit too cold for me, but faced with the alternative of no cool breezes at all, I’d opt for the air conditioning any day.
-Tanya
You may know that once every month, Doug Lippincott, executive director of communications, hosts a radio show on WFLR called Keuka College Today.
For this month’s show, which aired on Thursday, Doug is joined by Fran Crovetti, associate vice president of development, and LaMont Schiers, director of facilities, who talk about the Ball Hall renovation and The Campaign to Save Ball Hall.
Here’s a copy of the show that the folks over at WFLR were kind enough to share with us:
Part I:
Part II:
Part III:
Christine Steinkamp, a junior Organizational Communications and Marketing double major, is going to be sharing her Field Period experience with the world through her blog, The Three Rs and R News. As you may have guessed, she’ll be doing her Field Period at R News.
Feel free to pop on over to read about her experiences, or drop her some comments with words of encouragement/advice.
In other Keuka news, our 99th Commencement is going to be this Sunday. They’re calling for scattered thunder showers, but let’s keep our fingers crossed that they’re wrong.
– Pete
The railing coming from the main entrance up to the new lobby is being installed today.
Cool.
Just in case you missed the press conference on Friday with Jim Boeheim, head men’s basketball coach at Syracuse University, here’s a quick video clip of Boeheim talking about coming to Keuka to give the 9th Annual Carl and Fanny Fribolin Lecture.
