Pictured from Left to Right, MPTC Criminal Justice Instructor Jeff Gruss, IT Student Ana Chavez, Criminal Justice Students Shay Jaffke and Cheyanne Dipaola , Criminal Justice Instructor Joan Barfield, and Rotarian Kelly Norton.
Moraine Park Cultural Connections is an exciting, fun way to build real world career and life skills, gain self-confidence, and expand your awareness of diversity, global perspective and social responsibility.
Do you need 3 credits of social science to complete your degree requirements? If so, your cultural connections experience may be financial aid eligible! Each experience is linked to the MPTC online course Intro to Diversity. Check with your academic advisor today!
View our upcoming Cultural Connections opportunities! All opportunities are linked to academic course credit, financial aid-eligible and intended to give each student participant a meaningful experience outside the classroom, as well as the chance to have an impact on our local, domestic and global community.
Stop in at one of our upcoming information sessions! Each session is on all 3 campuses.
February 25
9:00 – 10:00 a.m. in A203, K204 and L151
2:00 – 3:00 p.m. in A203, K201 and N116
5:30 – 6:30 p.m. in E141, K209 and L151
February 26
9:00 – 10:00 a.m. in E141, K313 and L151
2:00 – 3:00 p.m. in E141, K313 and L151
5:30 – 6:30 p.m. in A203, K204 and N116
For more information, contact Anne Lemke, Student Community Impact Coordinator, alemke2@morainepark.edu or 920-924-3329
From Left to Right, MPTC President Bonnie Baerwald, Award Winner Renee Vnuk-Uhrman, MPTC Dean of General Studies Brenda Raad, MPTC Student Community Impact Coordinator Anne Lemke
Moraine Park Technical College is committed to community engagement and student success. The College supports these commitments through the opportunity for students to participate in student community impact and apply their classroom knowledge to an applicable, real world environment.
In 2018, MPTC started a community impact awards program where students can track their service hours, submit their reflections, and earn a Bronze Award for 25 hours, Silver Award for 50 hours,Gold Award for 100 hours, or Presidents Award for 200 hours of service learning or volunteering.
As of January, 2020, we have our very first President’s Award Winner – Renee Vnuk-Uhrman! Renee earned the President’s Award with over 220 volunteer hours to date!
Renee is a second year medical laboratory technician student, who took advantage of dual credit opportunities in high school and became a certified phlebotomist after graduating. She is also part of the College’s Promise Scholars program, our current MPTC Newman Civic Fellow, the Secretary for the MLT Student Club, and volunteers at her local community hospital as well as Campbellsport High School as a bowling and band coach; all while maintaining high academics.
Pictured here is Award Winner Renee Vnuk-Uhrman, Coach of Campbellsport HS Bowling Team.
“We are so proud of Renee,” Moraine Park President Bonnie Baerwald said. “She is a great role model and student leader, with such a strong dedication to her family, school, and community, and a true desire to make an impact. It was extra fun to present her with our first President’s Student Community Impact Award, which includes lunch with the President! We are all excited to see what comes next for Renee!”
Pictured from Right to Left: Marissa Schisel, Deputy David Tackett, Samantha Nowak, Valerie Stafford, Kimberly Peterson, Heidi Mahoney, Heather Fousek, Amy Harmsen (Missing: Tara Smith, Laura Jorgensen, Tyler Kaufman and Brian Wilhelms).
Amy Harmsen’s Fall, 2019 Business Practicum students made a generous impact on their local and global communities, while learning all the ins and outs of creating and managing a small business! 10 students in Amy’s fall class partnered with our local Just Fare Market and created their own Fair Trade Pop Up Shop with beautiful Mayan Hands friendship bracelets, mini chocolates from Equal Exchange, and hot cocoa and milk chocolate bars from Divine Chocolate.
(right to left) Valerie Stafford and Taran Smith
(right to left) Heather Fousek and Laura Jorgensen
(right to left) Rachel from Just Fare Market Marissa Schisel, Samantha Nowak, Valarie Stafford, Kimberly Peterson, Heather Fousek, Amy Harmsen
Students sold Fair Trade products throughout the semester and were very proud to use their profits to give donations of $179.07 each to the FDL County Sheriff’s Shop with a Cop program and the FDL Humane Society. Sales of the Fair Trade products also benefited farmers and artisans in Guatemala, Dominican Republic and Ghana! 3 students, Heather Fousek, Taran Smith and Valerie Stafford, also earned full scholarships to attend the National Fair Trade Colleges Conference in Pasadena, CA in March. Congratulations!
Moraine Park Technical College was named the first Fair Trade technical college in the U.S in May 2015! Fair trade supports farmers and artisans in developing countries. These producers lack economic opportunity and often face steep hurdles in finding markets and customers for their goods. Fair Trade is about making a tremendous impact on artisan and farmer communities while offering great products to the public all around the world.
FDL County Women, Infants and Children (WIC) Program Director Kara Kerrigan (left) worked with Nursing Student Halima Mahamed, (right) on her service learning project.
Nursing students in Instructor Michele Mengert’s Mental Health and Community Concepts course recently completed their community advocacy projects as part of our Fall, 2019 service learning opportunities. Michele said, “students are purposefully working to learn community oriented nursing. We want to target prevention as a priority. Nurses need to understand how to advocate for specific populations of people and have knowledge of the resource programs in your community that you can partner with to help your patients.”
This semester 20 students spent over 100 hours researching and collaborating with community partners to learn more about parenting, fostering, opioid addiction, poverty, developmental disabilities, domestic violence, sexual assault, and more. Students formulated detailed advocacy plans to address how a nurse could help a community identify and address these issues, providing education, awareness, advocacy and resources. Students gathered data to help determine strengths and weaknesses in their own communities. Project presentations were held on December 20.
Congratulations on all of this great work on important community issues!
Elizabeth Elrick, Big Brothers Big Sisters
Cameron Uecker, Premiere Care Methadone Clinic
Tina Schneider, FDL County DSS
Sarah Bubolz, Planned Parenthood
Halima Mahamed, WIC
Renee Kiesner, FDL County Health
Jeremy Chamberlain, FDL County Drug Free Community
The Dream Big project started in 2017 with Boys and Girls Club of Fond du Lac teens learning more about the over 100 careers available through MPTC. Now Dream Big has expanded throughout the MPTC district (Fond du Lac, Dodge, Washington and Green Lake Counties.) This is a great community partnership opportunity for Moraine Park students to showcase their careers and make a true community impact and for area teens to get excited about career choices!
Fond du Lac Boys and Girls Club Teen Services Director Dillon Wiese said, “We are so excited for these Dream Big opportunities! At Boys and Girls Clubs we work hard to prepare teens with life skills to get ready for the world of work. At Dream Big Auto teens learned about batteries, engines, changing tires and more! They also learned about how important their high school classes of math, science and english are for their future careers. Our partnership with MPTC is a great way for teens to explore their interests, learn about careers, get ready for college and know they really can achieve their dreams! Thank you MPTC!”
The Dream Big project started in 2017 with Boys and Girls Club of Fond du Lac teens learning more about the over 100 careers available through MPTC. Now Dream Big has expanded throughout the MPTC district (Fond du Lac, Dodge, Washington and Green Lake Counties.) This is a great community partnership opportunity for Moraine Park students to showcase their careers and make a true community impact and for area teens to get excited about career choices!
Fond du Lac Boys and Girls Club Teen Services Director Dillon Wiese said, “We are so excited for these Dream Big opportunities! At Boys and Girls Clubs we work hard to prepare teens with life skills to get ready for the world of work. At Dream Big Criminal Justice our students experienced finger printing, hand cuffing, jail cell searches, and what professional skills it takes to work in a criminal justice career. Our partnership with MPTC is a great way for teens to explore their interests, learn about careers, get ready for college and know they really can achieve their dreams! Thank you MPTC!”
Moraine Park Technical College is committed to community engagement and student success. The College supports these commitments through the opportunity for students to participate in student community impact and apply their classroom knowledge to an applicable, real world environment.
In 2018, MPTC started a community impact awards program where students can track their service hours, submit their reflections, and earn a Bronze Award for 25 hours, Silver Award for 50 hours,Gold Award for 100 hours, or Presidents Award for 200 hours of service learning or volunteering. In the 2019 fall semester, 17 students earned awards and logged over 800 hours of service!
Congratulations to the fall 2019 award winners!
Back Row left to right: MA students – Amy Kaminski, Heather Pieper, Olivia Sharp, Sarah Lemmenes, Ashley Despres, Brielle Aylesworth, Stephanie Dobek, Rhonda Roehl, Alysha Kurz. Front Row left to right: MA students – Brittany Enderle, Rebecca Wenninger, Kayla Wagner, Haley Ilkenhans, Erika Kaatz, Kylie Cody, Merinda Chamberlin, and Student Community Impact Coordinator Anne Lemke.
From Left to Right, Student Development Manager Kim Schwamn, Award Winner Meghan Griswold, Student Community Impact Coordinator Anne Lemke, MPTC President Bonnie BaerwaldFrom Left to Right, Student Development Manager Kim Schwamn, Award Winner Tania Torres, Business Technology Instructor Stephanie Murre-Wolf, Student Community Impact Coordinator Anne Lemke
Over 600 Grades 3-5 students and teachers from FDL and NFDL elementary schools, Riverside, STEM, and Friendship, and 50 plus community members enjoyed an amazing story from One Plastic Bag Author Miranda Paul!
Miranda Paul has been a teacher in Gambia as well as the owner of a Fair Trade store in Green Bay. Her presentation focused on two of her books, “One Plastic Bag” and “I am Farmer.” One Plastic Bag: Isatou Ceesay and the Recycling Women of the Gambiatells the inspiring story of five women who creatively dealt with their village’s plastic trash problem. Despite limited resources and ridicule, Isatou and her friends persevered for more than a decade, eventually realizing economic empowerment through their recycled plastic purse project.
I am Farmer, written in collaboration with Baptiste Paul, is the true story of how environmentalist Farmer Tantoh is transforming the landscape in his home country of Cameroon. When Tantoh Nforba was a child, his fellow students mocked him for his interest in gardening. Today he’s an environmental hero, and bringing clean water and bountiful gardens to the central African nation of Cameroon.
A big thank you to Just Fare Market for their Fair Trade education leadership and education grants from CSA and FDL Area Foundation in bringing Miranda Paul to visit for Fair Trade Month! Each 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade classroom also received a copy of One Plastic Bag and were able to get their books autographed by Miranda!
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