Ithaca Students Provide Specialized Care at Free Clinic

Ithaca College students are pairing up with the Ithaca Free Clinic right here in Tompkins County. Beginning this fall Occupational Therapy students volunteer at the clinic on a weekly basis. The students provide OT care for uninsured residents of Tompkins County and specifically the Ithaca Community. Associate Professor at Ithaca College, Julie Dorsey, is the faculty adviser of the program and says she was approached after the Ithaca Free Clinic expressed a need for rehabilitative services to the College.

“I became the point-person for the OT department to run the needs assessment,” Dorsey says. “I ran it as a class [last] Spring… to figure out what the actual need was in Tompkins County”.

Dorsey says that the need was found to be significant. In the video below, Graduate student Taryn Michelitch describes the process that the research class used to find out how badly Tompkins County needed OT services. Michelitch has been involved in the program since students first began research with Dorsey last Spring.



“We offer services that involve physical care, emotional, cognitive… OT is really a broad field,” says Anna Yahner. Yahner is a graduate student who joined the small group of students directed by Dorsey earlier this fall. “If someone comes in with a problem that limits their shoulder range of motion and that limits how much they can do in their daily life, we’ll work with them on their shoulder.”

Yahner says that although the Free Clinic does not currently have the resources to provide community integration services, they are aware of those services through other organizations. She adds that this is done on a case-by-case basis.

“Generally OT’s do community integration types of things,” she says. “We are pretty aware of what’s out there [in the community] so we can refer people according to their specific needs if they do need services beyond the Clinic.”

Those in the county who are in need of occupational services often need the care that IC students now provide. Dorsey talks about the vicious circle that community members can get dragged into without proper therapy in the video below.




The Ithaca Free Clinic is located at 225 S. Fulton St in Ithaca New York. Occupational Therapy services are now offered from 4-7 p.m. on Tuesdays by appointment. The number to reach them at is: (607) 330-1254
-- Written by Joy Kucinkas

An Everlasting Partnership

A brand name, national company supporting an upstate New York elementary school program?

That’s exactly the case at Newfield Elementary School. The school recently received a grant from Target to support the Elementary String Program. While the partnership was announced a few weeks ago, the program does not begin until October 16th this year.

Target has traditionally been striving to achieve a strong presence in the community and support educational programs. According to the company’s website, they discuss young kids saying, “More than anything, they’re our future. We can’t think of a more important investment.” What better to invest in than a program teaching students important life skills?



The program at Newfield Elementary School, which is in its second year, has been developed to help create and improve the skill that students have and uses a string instrument to help do this. Students learn how to increase their focus on something they are studying to learn and also help the kids listen better and adhere to instruction. Those from Kindergarten through third grade now have a place to learn vital life lessons.

Not many schools have the benefit of containing a string program. According to Sunshine Miller, who wrote the grant, “Only three string programs exist right now in Tompkins County…Lansing, Ithaca, and now Newfield. Also, only 34% of school districts in the country have string programs.” Newfield is also not the easiest place to obtain a program. Miller went on to say, “The budget is so small…and the town has no tax base. The constituency is also very poor, so to have the string program is unbelievable. We are very, very fortunate to have Target helping out.”



Target’s sponsorship of this program is just another display of its gracious efforts toward the community. In an interview with the Ithaca Journal, Target’s Laysha Ward, vice president of community relations, commented, “We’re proud to partner with Newfield Elementary School as part of our ongoing commitment to give back to the communities where our guests and team members live and work.” The company certainly has lived up to their word.

The success of the program so far has been the focal point. According to Miller, “The students really enjoy the program. It’s overwhelming. 100 percent of the students have decided to return from last year. We can only open 10 slots a year, and 60 kids want them.” This enjoyment has led to a positive partnership between the school and company.

Under the leadership of Denise Lowe-Nosewicz, the program has skyrocketed. She is a top-notch person to be conducting this program, having served as the principal second violinist for ten years in the Orchestra of the Southern Fingerlakes. In addition, the program offers students a cheaper alternative to outside music lessons, as it only asks students for a dollar a week. With Target helping out, it’s become a winning combination.



Photo: Denise Lowe-Nosewicz, Director of the Newfield Elementary String Program (courtesy Ithaca Journal)

--Michael Polak
Educational News Story

Northern Light Learning Center

- Emma Tanner
In-Depth Education Story

For many families accustomed to the public school system, taking the leap into homeschooling may seem like an insurmountable task. “A lot of the time people are very intimidated by homeschooling,” Jane Makarchuk of the Northern Light Learning Center says. “[People] think that they have to have special degrees and they have to have teaching experience, but you don’t, really. There are lot of resources out there, and there are a lot of people who can help you.”

The Northern Light Learning Center is just the resource. The NLLC is a homeschooling cooperative located in the Henry St. John Building in downtown Ithaca. The mission of the NLLC is “to create a community of homeschooling families and be able to provide opportunities to them - academic opportunities and social opportunities, even athletic opportunities, that they might otherwise not have,” Makarchuk says.

The NLLC offer a variety classes for homeschooling families. Classes are taught mainly by members of the Learning Center, but can also be taught by community members. “We have a theater class right now that’s being taught by a director from the Hangar Theater,” Makarchuk says.

Students choose classes that are of interest to them. During the enrollment period, the students rank the classes based on which classes they are most to least interested in. The instructor of the class decides how many students the class is open to, and which age groups the class will target.

Members of the Northern Light Learning Center are expected to contribute to the organization in some way. Most contribute by offering a course, but others take positions as administrative positions or help to clean around the Learning Center as ways to help out. “You can’t come to the learning center and just take,” Makarchuk says. “You have to give.”

The families who are involved in the NLLC are “from every walk of life,” Makarchuk says. The students range in ages 3 to 17, and the families come from various economic and social backgrounds. “The people who started the Learning Center are our members,” Makarchuk says. “There were four people with this vision and this idea, and they just did it.”

Makarchuk serves as Chairman on the Board of the NLLC, and is also a member of the Learning Center. She worked as a public school teacher for ten years, but decided to homeschool when it came time for her children to begin their education. Makarchuk stresses the importance of community at the Learning Center and its role as a resource in and beyond the Ithaca community. “For people who have thought of homeschooling, but have felt like they needed support, the Learning Center will help them make that decision,” says Makarchuk.

The Northern Light Learning Center has been well received in the Ithaca Community. “Everybody I talk to thinks [the NLLC] sounds really great,” Makarchuk says. “We haven’t had any negative reactions.” And why would they? Their cooperative community has offered a network of support for families who are working toward a common goal: an effective education for their children.

Multicultural Teaching through Music – An Outreach to the Community

- Samantha Allen, In-Depth Story, Education


Last Thursday, the Ithaca College school of music presented an evening of global enchantment. With the participation of 85 students studying with Dr. Baruch Whitehead, and special guest Sulley Imoro from West Africa, the presentation of elaborate dances and African rhythms took off in the campus’ Ford Hall.

Many audience members were surprised to learn the college had an education devoted to such diverse music, dance and celebration. But according to Dr. Whitehead, the teachings, including African tribal drumming based on his travels to Ghana in West Africa, have been going on for four years, and have extended even beyond the college campus.

“Whenever you have a college that’s situated in a community, it’s incumbent on a college to reach out,” he said. “We need to provide any kind of support that we can do in terms of enriching our community via the arts.”

Janet Galvan, professor music education and an advocate for Dr. Whitehead’s educational program, also works as artistic director of the Ithaca Children's Choir to reach out to the community. Galvan said she brought back teachings she had gathered from her personal studies in African music to benefit her choir as well as other young and willing students.

“I teach, like [Dr. Whitehead], in cultural context which means that we share the cultural setting for the music,” she said. “He and I are working to make Ithaca a center for the study of multicultural music.


Whitehead said that he and his colleagues work with the Greater Ithaca Activities Center (GIAC) on their community music-education project that has been running since 2003 from the Ithaca College campus. They also work with elementary school students, particularly at Beverly J. Martin (BJM).

Jacqueline Scott, a secretary at BJM, said the school has been working with the college’s professors for years. In their after-school program, students are able to learn about things outside their typical classroom, including Dr. Whitehead’s African drumming lessons. Scott boasts that their program has a very long waiting list.

“Most of our curriculum is ethnocentric. We need to make sure our kids are getting an education,” Scott said. “And not just listening to music from dead white composers.”

Abby Cook, a junior, who is taking Dr. Whitehead’s “Worlds of Music” course and performed in last week’s presentation, said she thought teaching multicultural music was especially important for young people.

“It is always beneficial for a community to learn about and experience something out of the ordinary,” Cook said. “…It shows them that there are many different sounds, beats, messages and people all over the world.”

But according to Cook, the education can be just as enriching when you’re in college.

“I decided to take the class because I wanted to learn more about where our modern western music came from, to study its roots and become more aware of music from around the world,” she said.

PHOTO: (below) taken from the Ithacan article last year on education, shows Ghana guest Sulley Imoro teaching IC students some percussive rhythms.

Relearning History through the Study of Africa

-Jillian Rubin
In-depth Education Story

"Working to eliminate race, class and disability as predictors of student success," says the Ithaca Central School District Equity Homepage. The Instructional Specialist for Educational Equity of the Ithaca Central School District, Barry Derfel, has been a long time advocate for creating and maintaining equity within Ithaca's schools.



(Barry Derfel, taken from the Ithaca Central School District Equity Homepage).

Derfel serves as a mentor to the teachers within the Ithaca district, guiding them in the right direction toward establishing educational equality. He stresses the use of a multicultural approach in education - exploring all perspectives and giving them equal weight in what and how things are taught.

I guess the students of Ithaca College taking the Introduction to African Diaspora course were not introduced to this multicultural approach to learning history in their schools. The course, taught by Professor Sean Eversley-Bradwell, introduces students to a completely different perspective of American history, African history, and the combination of the two.


(Students of Introduction to African Diaspora actively engaged in Professor Eversley-Bradley's lecture).

The first block of the semester revolved around defining the concepts presented in the readings that were assigned. Such concepts included diaspora, antiquity, African diaspora and an Afrocentric educational approach to history. Every single one of these terms were completely foreign to each student in the class - both black and white.

Christine Estevez, a junior journalism major at Ithaca College and a student enrolled in Professor Eversley-Bradley's course, reflects on her study of history in elementary school:



So why weren't we ever taught this in elementary, middle, or high school? In Molefi Kete Asante's The Afrocentric Idea in Education, he says that it is necessary to put students "within the context of their own cultural references" in order to understand other cultural references. History was written from a white, Eurocentric point of view, excluding non-white students.

Later on in the interview, I had asked Christine if she felt that the history she learned, from elementary school through high school, felt like a waste of time after relearning history in the Introduction to Diaspora class:



But Ithaca is making a valiant effort in attempting to encompass all cultural perspectives within their historical curriculum. Although I was not able to enter one of Ithaca's schools, Christine told me of the diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds present in the Beverly J. Martin school of Ithaca, NY. This school was named after Ithaca's first African-American school administrator. Martin devoted herself to multicultural education and mentoring the idea of diversity. She set a precedent for the idea of equity that Derfel is advocating for currently.

For further information as to what the Ithaca community and Ithaca schools are up to in relation to educational equality, visit the district website , which links to all of the elementary, middle, and high schools within the district. Also, the active Ithaca village gives equity reports of progress of the equity movement within the schools and the advocacy for equality among the community.

I leave you all with a defining symbol of the study of Africa and African-Americans: The relationship of the New World to the Old World:



The Sankofa: One must know one's past in order to look forward (taken from the Sankofa International Championing Female Education Website).

Alternative Education in Ithaca: The Montessori Method.

In-Depth Education Story
--Eric Raue

Traditional public schools typically present students with a predetermined schedule. There is a separate time for math, science, reading, and other subjects. But the Montessori method, developed by Dr. Maria Montessori, combines all subjects and materials and divides children into classes not based on age, but on periods of development. The method aims to allow students to learn in their own ways.

“Every child is really moving through every curricula area at their own speed,” said Andrea Riddle, principal of the Elizabeth Ann Clune Montessori School on East King Road in Ithaca.

The role of the teacher in Montessori is that of a facilitator and guide, aiming to allow student’s own natural curiosity to drive their learning. The Elizabeth Ann Clune School’s website explains that Montessori allows children to “make their own discoveries.” And in a place with as much natural beauty as Ithaca, there’s always lots to discover. Instead of learning facts about nature, children have opportunities to go out and interact with it directly.

“We go the lake,” Riddle said. “We always talk about it in Montessori as geography through the feet, and history through the heart.”

In the classroom, students aren’t given assignments. Learning materials are presented and explained, and students can freely interact throughout the day as they see fit. Lessons of spelling, science, math, and interpersonal skills like sharing and cooperation are weaved into children's experiences throughout the school day.






The level of freedom in the classroom is quite a bit higher than in traditional classrooms. This is a common theme in many forms of alternative education. Joe Greenberg, the principal of Ithaca’s Lehman Alternative Community School, or LACS, said that not only do alternative schools tend to give students more power over their curriculum, but aspects like community service and self-growth are emphasized more. Greenberg said students are also empowered because they chose the school and show up every day not because they have to, but because they want to learn.

“Every student is there by choice…they’re free to leave and go back to their regularly assigned school. But the expectations are greater when you choose to go to a school as opposed to being assigned,” Greenberg said.

In the case of Montessori Schools, students not only choose to be there, but they choose how to learn. At the Elizabeth Ann Clune School, students are even free to take their learning outside the classroom.

“We extend our classroom beyond the classroom door,” Riddle said. “So on beautiful days like today, every classroom in our school is designed with a door that goes to the outside, and the doors are opened…there are choices that take children outside so kids are tending gardens, they’re taking care of animals.”




These sorts of activities are used to teach lessons like science, environmental appreciation, cooperation, and independence, all learned through supplementary materials and the teacher’s guidance. Sometimes these materials are not man-made: Riddle found that students benefited more from the natural landscape around the school than they could from any playground.

“After being here a year, I decided I would never put up a playground because what wound up happening was that kids became custodians of the land in a way that was profound,” Riddle said.

By making the world the students' playground, Montessori tries to eliminate the separation between work and play. The aim is to make learning a part of life and, as the Elizabeth Ann Clune School website states, “not a task to be endured.” Indeed, at first glance students in the classrooms looked more like they were playing than doing schoolwork. Every classroom buzzed with activity. Materials ranging from puzzles to cooking materials kept the children busily occupied.

The school’s cooking materials are one example of how Montessori works. While a traditional elementary school might have a play kitchen, a Montessori class will actually introduce children to real-world cooking tools to facilitate learning in a variety of areas.

“They learn how to fry an egg, they learn how to make toast, they learn how to heat boiling water and add it to oatmeal,” Riddle said.

Cooking their own food is used to teach children independence, while sharing the final product with other students is meant to teach social skills like good manners and peer cooperation. Smaller class sizes, typical in many institutions of alternative education, help teachers in the school to weave these lessons with each student’s individual needs in mind. The ratio of students to teachers in the school is about 1 to 12.

“There’s a sense of personalization in a smaller school setting,” Greenberg said. “Students will be honored for their individual characteristics a little bit more.”


Additional Links:
-The Montessori Foundation

-The Urban Institute-An Overview of Alternative Education

Building Fire on Aurora Street- UPDATE

-Samantha Allen



Assistant Chief Daniel Tier III, of the Ithaca City Fire Department, released today that the county dispatch received a 911 call from an occupant on Aurora St. in Ithaca at 4:03 p.m. on Friday. Tier said response arrived at 4:07 p.m. The fire was contained and out within a matter of minutes.

The investigation of the cause of the fire concluded on Saturday that there was an electrical problem.

"It's been ruled as accidental," Tier said.

Tier guessed that there was most likely with the wiring of that particular city grid, and that caused the power surge.

"This is a unique situation in that the electrical transformer that supplies that particulur grid had some sort of failure," he said. "It sent a power surge to that whole grid."

According to Tier, 13 houses are on this particular grid and 5 other houses reported some sort of electrical damage that same day after the surge.

"There may be some others but that’s all that we know about," he said.

The New York State Electrical Department or Ithaca City Public Works have returned my calls for comment. In a brief interview today, the local Red Cross chapter confirmed that this apartment housed 12 people, 10 of which are IC students. All have been displaced and put into on-campus housing by the RHA and Public Safety.

THIS IS AN UPDATE TO A PREVIOUS POST. CHECK IT OUT HERE.

ESL Students Expose Student Teacher to Diverse Classroom

- Michelle Skowronek
In-Depth Education Story


The sounds of sneakers squeak down the hallway as 24 fourth graders line up to enter the Northeast Elementary School gymnasium. They file into the room and take a seat on the floor framing the circumference of the child-friendly emblems painted on the floor. Boys and girls of all shapes, sizes, and ethnicities plop down on red circles, green squares, blue triangles and yellow rectangles while “Mr. H” lines up rows of volleyballs.

Brian Horner is an Ithaca College undergraduate student teacher. As he finishes up his last semester at IC, Horner teaches physical education at two different public school locations. His first placement is at Northeast Elementary, and his second will be at Charlotte High School in Rochester, NY.

On top of learning basic teaching skills, Horner gets hands on experience working with English as a Second Language (ESL) students. Northeast Elementary alone enrolls students from over 23 different countries. Cornell University plays a large role in the diversity at Northeast due to its assorted population of graduate students and professors. Mr. H has a handful of ESL students in his P.E. classes, most are Asian.

“When most people think of ESL students, they think of Hispanics, but most of my classes are made up of Asian ESL students,” he said. “Majority of the Asian students have parents working or studying at Cornell. Some of them understand English, others do not at all.”

Ithaca College professor of Social and Cultural Foundations of Education, Roberta Wallitt, trains student teachers to be culturally competent with an understanding of the needs of English language learners. Wallitt says classroom teachers often lack this training.

“They may not present in ways that are accessible to ESL students: demonstrating instead of just talking; using pictures; having hands-on activities,” she said. “They may also not know how to connect lessons to the students' experiences and cultures to help them understand.”

Mr. H has experienced the need to make phys ed class even more hands on when working with ESL students. Sometimes he needs to act out an activity with another student while explaining the directives.

“The other day I had to explain the next activity with more than just words,” Horner said. “I had another English speaking student demonstrate with me what the rest of the class would be doing. Then I slowed down and simplified my language until the ESL student seemed to understand.”

Here is a video of Mr. H teaching students how to rotate positions in volleyball.



Wallitt suggests jumping into a foreign student’s culture to better understand the student.

“Attending community events is another learning experience,” she said. “When they [teachers] only view students’ behaviors through an ‘American’ lens, they are likely to misinterpret and not be successful teachers.”

Horner says his experience at Northeast Elementary has greatly prepared him for teaching in multi-cultural settings, but most importantly, it has been an enjoyable experience.

“I love working with younger kids,” he said, “because that’s when P.E. is still fun. Effectively communicating with all the students, foreign or not, is an extra added bonus.”





A student lays exhausted after Mr. H says "freeze", ending that day's activities.

Ready to Learn

-Ursula Fox-Koor
In-depth education story




The lights were fluorescent. All the seats were taken. Syllabi were being handed out. The auditorium was filled with over 300 students. Brendan Jessop was not ready for this.

Jessop, a freshman at West Virginia University and graduate of Ithaca High School, says that his high school experience did not prepare him for college. “There’s so much more work in college. You dedicate a lot more time to it but you also you have to know how to spend your time wisely,” he said.

Freshmen on campuses across the country are facing the same problem as Jessop. More and more students are realizing that having a high school diploma does not necessarily guarantee being prepared for college. According to a survey conducted by Achieve, Inc., as many as four in ten high school graduates are not prepared. Professors agree, estimating that 42% of their students are not adequately prepared, according to the survey.

Jessop’s experiences prove these results to be true. The Tompkins County alumni says he wishes that his high school workload had been harder. “They teach you some what, but they could increase the workload, you know tell you what you’re going to experience, give at least somewhat of an idea compared to college,” he says.

But this isn’t a problem only for Ithaca High School students. Students from other high schools who have chosen to attend college in Tompkins County say they are facing the same problem.

Kenny Delgado, a freshman Integrated Marketing Communications major at Ithaca College says he had no idea how different the college workload would be. “High school was a joke,” he said. “It was how much could you do before the class began; you’d do your homework during the school day, but now it’s completely different because I have so much more work… I’m really having trouble adjusting to it.”

Alex Hardy, a freshman at Ithaca College, agrees. He was prepared for the lifestyle change of college, but not the academics. “As far as the classroom, I wasn’t fully prepared,” he said.

So why are so many college freshman feeling unprepared? The study faults high schools’ standards and low expectations. According to the Achieve, Inc. study, only 24% of high school graduates reported that they faced high expectations in high school. Areas such as reading, research, mathematics and writing are all areas in which many high school graduates wish they could have been more prepared.

Jessop says that his high school curriculum in Ithaca “could have been better for English and writing papers. I never really learned how to construct a well- formatted paper.”

This lack of preparation has led many high schools to adjust their expectations of students by adding more honors and Advanced Placement courses in order to raise the standards for graduation. Schools hope these changes will better prepare students for their future college endeavors.

Jessop wishes Ithaca High School had implemented these standards while he was a student and thinks he would have made more of an effort had there been higher expectations. “You can bullshit your way through everything, but you can’t coast in college if you want to get something from it,” he said.

For more information, check out these articles from Education Week and The Apple.



Brendan Jessop, an Ithaca High School alumni, felt inadequately prepared for his courses at West Virginia University.

The Trouble in the Middle School Years

-Aly Dixon
In-depth education story




Walking into Dewitt Middle School during lunchtime is a fascinating sight. At one o’clock, the 8th graders are eating lunch, but more children are running around, chatting, whispering to each other, and playing with their cell phones than eating.

Of course, fooling around is expected of most children, but more and more middle schools are having trouble keeping students disciplined and willing to work. Rich Bernstein, Guidance Counselor at Dewitt Middle School says at the middle school age it’s a struggle to know where the line is; a lot of the students don’t know when they are overstepping behavioral boundaries.


Since the No Child Left Behind Act, many schools are struggling to keep up with the curriculum requirements. Because of this, Bernstein says, there is less time to spend on behavioral issues due to the emphasis on standardized tests and keeping up with curriculum.

However, unlike many middle schools in New York State, The Ithaca City School District requires all teachers to have a bachelor's degree. Bernstein says that a lot of the teachers have tried to do more project orientated assignments rather than simple independent work as a part of an effort to promote cooperative and developmental learning.

However, it still remains hard to keep kids on task.
"They have no discipline to stick with things," Bernstein says. Now more than ever kids are texting, playing video games, or talking on their phones in school. Bernstein admits that a lot of problems are beyond their control.

"These kids have facebook, which is ridiculous, and it causes problems that are outside of school, and it's something we can't control," he says.

At Dewitt Middle School, to try and make the younger students more comfortable there are no bells between classes. Because of this, sixth graders rarely run into the eighth, which helps the younger students who tend to get intimidated by the older kids.

Bernstein says he tries to make contact with the students as much as possible. There are more divorced parents these days so students are facing more problems at home, he says.

"Middle school kids are definitely tougher than the elementary but they still want to please and they're not quite formed in their habits so it makes it fun," Bernstein says. It appears that Dewitt Middle School is doing their best to ensure the success of their students and their behavioral development, but with the No Child Left Behind Act putting more focus on tests and less on personal development, and the increasing use of cell phones, facebook, and other new technologies for this age group, they have serious obstacles to face.

For further reading on this topic visit the New York Times series on Middle School: The Critical Years

Solar System Tour: Space Lessons in Downtown Ithaca

-Kaitlyn Rich

  In-depth Education Story

This Sunday over 300 people, young and old, went on an out of this world tour of the solar system, all without leaving downtown Ithaca. Residents were lead through the Sciencenter's Carl Sagan Planet Walk by local celebrity scientist Bill Nye "The Science Guy". The walk which included all the planets, even Pluto, was part of the fortieth annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society's Division for Planetary Sciences, held at Cornell University. This year though organizers wanted walkers to launch their thoughts toward a new perspective of the solar system. 

"The science of planets, to me, helps us understand our planet and our place in the universe. And that humans, with our little brains, can understand all this is pretty exciting. So lets take a walk!" said Nye to start the tour. The reverberating sentiment of the day was for those involved to take a different look at our solar system. 

"Our goal with the Sagan Planet Walk is not so much for people to take away a lot of facts, although that is a part of it," said Executive Director of the Sciencenter, Charlie Trautmann, "but to get a sense of the scale of our universe and how the Earth is just a small part in the overall universe."

The almost mile long walk started around noon on Sunday in the Ithaca Commons, at the Sun station. The group then passed the other planets on its way to the Pluto station at the Sciencenter, hearing about each planets facts from an expert astronomer along the way. "I hope that everyone can get an appreciation of how much space there is in space - it's empty," said Nye speaking about the scale of the model. 

"They're a wonderful teaching tool, they allow you to see how big our solar system is," said Mark Buie, Pluto expert from the Southwest Research Institute. Besides for drawing an audience due to its uniqueness as a teaching tool, Trautmann added that, "It's wonderful to have Bill Nye and other astronomers. Their reputation really brought a lot of people here."

Along with learning a new respect for the scale of the universe, the weekend was also full of many other activities. "This event today was sponsored by the Cornell Astronomy Department's conference that they're having," said Trautmann, "besides sponsoring the tour they have a lot of other activities." However, the walk seemed to attract the most visitors out of the weekend's events. "We've done public tours like this from time to time but the turn out for this was so good that we should really consider doing it more often," he said.

Overall though the expanding of knowledge of our place in the solar system and the planets we call neighbors was the real purpose of the walk. Some of the most interesting facts came from Buie who, despite the fact that Pluto has been demoted from planet status, still told the crowd all about his specialty. "Well it's a planet to me, and if Pluto wasn't a planet we would have to rewrite the history books because there would be about 40 planets," Buie said.

Similarly, he spoke about the NASA spacecraft heading to Pluto. "The fastest space craft we've ever built is on its way to Pluto, it just past Saturn and it still won't be there until 2015," said Buie, "that's how big our solar system is." The craft left earth in 2006 and will be the first object sent specifically to study Pluto. "I think we should put a little stake in the ground so people can see the progress," said Buie,"so people can be like oh I remember when the spacecraft was on that street."

With the hour long, and almost four billion cosmic mile journey from the Sun to Pluto over, it was Nye who put the days learnings truly into perspective. "The fact that we can see these, by human standards enormous objects and by cosmic standards tiny objects, from Earth really gives us pause to think about our place in the universe."

Photographs: (Top to Bottom) Pluto station, with facts about the former planet and map of Sagan Planet Walk; Crowd gathers around the Sun station in the Commons for the start of the walk; Buie explains facts about Pluto to a large crowd outside of the Sciencenter; Astronomers, including Mark Buie (far left), scrutinize the Pluto station. Many facts were outdated according to Buie.

Maduka Leaves CU Basketball Team

We here at Tracking Tompkins County try to keep stories news oriented, but this was too important to pass up, especially if you are a Big Red basketball fan.

Cornell Women's basketball player Jeomi Maduka has chosen to leave the team and focus her career on Track and Field. The decision was apparently very hard for Maduka, who was a two-sport All-American and also was named the 2007-08 Ivy League Women's Basketball Player of the Year. Now a senior, it was time for her to choose between Track and Field and Basketball.

On the track, Maduka was named All-American 3 times for her efforts and a two-time Top 10 finisher at the NCAA Track and Field Championships during her Big Red career. She was convinced that Track and Field was her biggest strength this summer when she competed in the Olympic Trials for Long Jump as well as several other events.

For more on the big news, you can read this article from the Ithaca Journal.

--Michael Polak

One Millionth Sciencenter Visitor

The Sciencenter in Ithaca recorded its one millionth visitor on Columbus Day. Bella and Alice Hu, 6-year-old twins were the honored guests. 

For more on the milestone, check out the Ithaca Journal's story here.

The Sciencenter is a not-for-profit organization operating in Ithaca since 1983. 

--Nate March

Exonerated: Kerry Max Cook speaks at Ithaca College

-Kaitlyn Rich

On Friday Kerry Max Cook spoke to a packed audience in Textor room 102 about his life - spending over 20 years on death row for a crime he did not commit. Speaking in his southern accent Kerry recounted how at the age of 19 he was wrongfully arrested and pressured to confess to the murder of a woman he had only met once. The details of his trial and life in prison were shocking and heart-wrenching. While in solitary confinement he stacked peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to keep track of time, and during his imprisonment he lost his beloved brother and father.

Cook was sentenced to death with only a fingerprints worth of evidence and a false testimony by a bribed inmate against him. The prosecution threw out all 13 other fingerprints and didn't test the blood at the crime scene because, as Cook says, "They said it was the same color as the rest of the blood there." 

"If you google my name it comes up as the worst case of prosetorial misconduct in the history of the United States," said Cook. All the horrible details of the failings of the American justice system and its effect on Cook's, and others, lives where brought to reality in the play "The Exonerated" performed by the Ithaca College Theater Department. The Saturday night performance offered a talk back with Cook, where students and Ithaca residents alike asked Cook questions struggling to comprehend the unfathomable experience him, and the five other stories in the play, went through. Cook told the crowd that he survived his challenges by finding forgiveness and perseverance in the face of adversity.

"Each One, Reach One"- In-depth Education Story

By: Tracey A. Casseus

In college many students enter eager to change the world. Some find their route in politics or science while others seek to change the world one young person at a time.

Few bonds in life are more influential than those formed during adolescence and being a mentor is one of the most important things as well as the simplest one can do for a child. To a child a mentor is an everyday hero who transforms a life or a community through their commitment to make a difference. No special skills are needed; just the willingness to care and spend time with someone who needs you.


For Ithaca College students looking for a way to give back to the Ithaca community and make a difference in the life someone younger the new Student to Student Mentoring Program was just what they were looking for.
The Student to Student Mentoring Program was founded in 2007 through the Ithaca College Community Church. This specific mentoring program partners Ithaca College students with elementary school students at Beverly J. Martin Elementary in downtown Ithaca.

“I like the program,” said 8 year old mentee Mariah. “There are a lot of things you can do, its not just about doing homework, you get to have fun and go places."
The mentoring program meets at least two times per month, solely on Saturdays from around 1pm-4pm at the elementary school.

The goals of this program are not only to create a positive atmosphere for these elementary school students but also to give back to the greater Ithaca community. This program focuses on social skills, academics, as well as self-esteem issues. Most importantly, IC students strive to serve as role models for these students in hopes of creating a growing interest in recieving a college education.

Brionna, a 7-year-old second grader and sister to Mariah explained how she got involved with the program. “There was a paper in me and my sisters backpack about it and I gave it to our mom and we said, ‘are you going to sign us up or not?’ and she said yes.”

Brionna had only good things to say about the program, “It’s good, we get to write and read and I like writing poems and playing in the gym.” The majority of these students come from under-represent groups in society in terms racially, socially, or economically.

Mentor, Chasity Dittmann, a sophomore Television Radio major had this to say as to why she became involved with the program, “Personally I really just want to be a strong positive influence on the young children I come into contact with. I think it’s important to encourage them to go to college, to respect others and respect themselves. I have been thinking about going into education because I realize there are a lot of children growing up without guidance that need it, so that is pretty much my inspiration thus far.”

Becoming a mentor is not a job for these students; no one gets paid for their time or receives class credit. These students take on the roles of delegator, role model, cheerleader, advocate, and friend with these young children as part of their 'commitment to excellence.

'

Sundae Showdown: Ithaca vs. Two Rivers

By: Kaitlyn Rich

Everyone has heard the local story of how Ithaca, New York is the birthplace of the ice cream sundae. The fact has even been known to show up on professor's quizzes. But is Ithaca the real home of the sundae? Another small town, almost 900 miles away seems to think differently.

Two Rivers, Wisconsin has been challenging Ithaca's title for years. As the Ithaca Journal reported, the town of Two Rivers claims that the sundae was created there in 1881 by Ed Berners, more than ten years before  Ithaca's creation in 1892 by Chester Platt. However, recently two Ithaca High School students have found new evidence disclaiming Two Rivers contention. The students discovered Berners' obituary which dates the sundaes creation to 1899 and Berners' birth certificate that would have made him 16 at the time of the invention - which many think is unlikely.

While Two Rivers proclaims itself as the "the REAL birthplace of the ice cream sundae", the jury is still out on the verdict. But, regardless of who invented the sundae Ithaca does have a heads up on Two Rivers- Purity Ice Cream. I went last week to see just what was so great about the Ithaca sundae. I ordered the "Black Forest" sundae (black cherry ice cream, warm brownie, delicious) and my good friend, and fellow blogger, Ursula ordered the "Malt-ball Meltdown." In the video below, she explains just what makes the Ithaca sundae so good.

                                            

New Sustainable Building Completed at Cornell.

A new biological sciences laboratory has been completed at Cornell University, with space for hundreds of researchers and multiple departments that had previously been scattered in different buildings all across campus.

The environmentally-friendly building boasts a vegetative roof and makes use of natural sunlight, not unlike the new business school here on the Ithaca campus. Architect Richard Meier designed the $162 million-dollar building, which is one of only 5 university laboratory buildings to receive a gold rating through the LEED Green Building Rating System.

The building's dedication will take place this Thursday, October 16th, from 3 to 6 PM.

--Eric Raue

A Weekend Trip to Vermont!

It was wild and wacky, but the Bombers pulled off the win.

Ithaca’s football team rebounded from a tough 37-6 loss to St. John Fisher with a 41-6 victory at Norwich University this Saturday. The Bombers win improved them to 4-1 overall and 2-1 in the Empire 8. While a win’s a win, IC certainly played very sloppy, fumbling the ball 4 times and throwing an interception as well.

For me, one of the broadcaster’s on WICB, I really enjoyed the trip because it gave me a chance to see a military school for the first time. It was a cool experience getting to see all the cadets marching out onto the field and doing their drills. In addition, the school had a tank on the field that even served in Normandy, and they also had a cannon that they fired after Norwich kick-offs and touchdowns. It was a very cool experience.

However, it was even better getting to see the school when it was family weekend. Every family, and I mean, every family literally came out to support a team, even though it is not very good. In addition, the athletic facilities were very well kept and very nice for a Division III facility. I thoroughly enjoyed my experience in Vermont this past weekend and think you should visit a military school one day. Take a look at the photo of me with the Tank at the Stadium!



--Michael Polak

Experiencing Barriers

Feature Education Story.

The “Understanding Disability” students at Ithaca College used two innovative techniques to do what the course title implies. Professor Judy Kennison assigned her class an hour in a wheelchair as well as a day in earplugs. The college announced the assignment in a September news release.

“Barrier Experiences” is the name of the project. Kennison says the assignment’s purpose is to foster an “awareness of the challenges posed by physical and social disabilities.”

There are 41 students in the course. The students break up into pairs and each take a turn navigating a predetermined route around the campus in a wheel chair. Each student also spends a day wearing industrial earplugs to simulate hearing impairment. The students write a paper about their experiences.

Kennison said the wheelchair assignment predates her tenure at the school. She added the earplug portion as a means of expanding the students’ experiences. Several students find the social ramifications of the hearing impairment equally difficult, if not more difficult than using the wheelchair. Check out these statistics on the prevalence of hearing impairment.

Kennison called the chairs “institutional,” saying they are typical of what someone with limited economic resources would probably use. The Ithaca College campus poses a particularly tough challenge for the wheelchair users. Its many slopes are a struggle to navigate.

“I knew the campus was not good for wheelchairs,” sophomore physical therapy major Lisa Russell said. The assignment confirmed her suspicions.

Kennison said that while she doesn’t believe the project can truly simulate the actual feeling of having a disability, she hopes it makes her students think about the everyday issues a disability imposes. Something as simple as a trip to the dining hall can become a challenging ordeal.

Senior Annette Dudarewicz and junior Katherine Wilson demonstrated using the wheelchair in the video below.



Here is another story on the “Barrier Experiences” project.

--Nate March

Bill Nye The Science Guy in Ithaca

Bill Nye the Science Guy made a special appearance on the Ithaca Commons this afternoon. Nye, a Cornell graduate, was in town for the 40th annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society’s Division for Planetary Sciences which started on Thursday and will continue until Wednesday, the 15th. Nye led a huge crowd on the Carl Sagan Planet Walk, a 1 to 5 billion scale model of the solar system, which starts on the Commons and ends at the Sciencenter. Pictured above are Nye and Kevin McGouldrick of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, standing at the planet Venus.

--Maura Gladys