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October 16, 2007
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Minneapolis native Maria Roesler received Outstanding
Young Alumna honors from her alma mater, Dana College in Blair,
Neb., during Homecoming weekend last Friday.
Roesler has a distinguished record of service in her short professional career.
The 2005 Dana College graduate is a project coordinator in the Dominican Republic
and Haiti for ProLiteracy Worldwide, a nonprofit international literacy organization.
One of her greatest achievements has been to create a network between the eight
Dominican organizations supported by ProLiteracy Worldwide in the Dominican Republic.
The alliance, which reaches around 8,000 people, focuses on HIV/AIDS prevention
and will start to provide literacy classes.
Roesler’s connection to the Dominican Republic and her route to her future
job began as a student at Dana. Maria studied abroad during her junior year as
a volunteer for a literacy program called Project ABC. The program promotes literacy
in bateyes, communities of mostly Haitian immigrants to the Dominican Republic.
Project ABC is supported by ProLiteracy Worldwide, Maria’s current employer.
In fact, ProLiteracy Worldwide approached Maria upon graduation from Dana to
fill the position of coordinator in the Dominican Republic. At that time, she
decided to join Beyond Borders, a nonprofit Christian organization that assists
the poor with literacy programs, education reform, and crisis support in Haiti,
to live in Haiti and learn the Haitian Creole language and culture.
When she reached the end of her learning position with Beyond Borders, Roesler
was contacted by ProLiteracy again and this time she accepted.
Social work professor Jan Potter presented the award to Roesler.
She described Roesler as having “amazing intellectual
curiosity” and “immense
compassion.” |
“
She manages to combine the head and the heart in an amazing way,” Potter
said.
While at Dana, Roesler was both involved and honored. She graduated
summa cum laude as a Morton Scholar with a major in Spanish. She
as active in Young Democrats, H.O.P.E. (Helping Our People Expand),
and the Social Awareness Organization. She served on a committee
for the Liberal Arts Reading Program (LARP) and was on the planning
committee for the 2005 Cultural Fair. She was also a member of Alpha
Mu Gamma, the national foreign language honor society.
In accepting the award, Roesler praised her academic experience at
Dana College, especially the cross-cultural requirements of the Morton
Scholars honors program and the Liberal Arts Reading Program (LARP). “If
it wasn’t for the education I received at Dana, I would not
be able to do what I am doing now.”
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For
more information,
contact:
Carrie L. Reed, Director of College Relations
and Marketing,
402-426-7385, creed@dana.edu
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