Jesuit Foundation Grants Open Doors to Service Opportunities
From youth empowerment to service programs in India, the spring 2003 Jesuit Foundation grants give faculty and staff the opportunity to use $12,000 for justice and theological programs. The 2002-03 recipients were honored by the foundation at a dinner Oct. 7.
The grants, awarded each semester by the USF Jesuit Foundation, fund activities that relate to Ignatian spirituality, be it development of academic programming, curricula, or research, or interdisciplinary dialogue on current events. Since the foundation began its awards program in fall 2000, it has given 54 grants for a total of $230,000 to faculty and staff, said Jack Treacy, rector of the USF Jesuit community.
The following are the spring 2003 recipients:
 David Batstone, associate professor of theology and religious studies, received $5,000 for a Globalization and Social Justice Immersion Program in India. Students enrolled in the Erasmus Project will travel to Northern India in May for a tour of the country’s social justice issues and solutions. “It’s an opportunity for us to expand our horizons, from a domestic approach to an international approach,” Batstone said. The group will spend a week at the Gandhian Institute studying Gandhi’s philosophy of peace, another week in New Delhi addressing global trade and poverty, and a week in Dharmasala, where they will have a private audience with the Dalai Lama and study the political challenges facing the Tibetan government in exile.
Jack McLean, service learning coordinator for the Leo T. McCarthy Center for Public Service and the Common Good, received $1,000 for a USF-hosted National Conference for Service Learning Directors. The conference, to be held Nov. 21–22, is limited to service learning directors and will include presentations on how service learning supports the Jesuit mission. “We focus on what’s unique about the service program here as opposed to at (non-Jesuit) schools,” McLean said.
Glori Simmons, manager of the Thacher Gallery, received $5,000 for a USF Runaway with Words Pilot Site Project at the San Francisco Boys and Girls Club, a group home for youths on probation. In conjunction with the Thacher Gallery and the MFA program, this arts outreach program will include two five-week sessions in which USF students and program directors teach poetry and art. “The more intangible goal is helping these kids have a way to express themselves in a fun, safe environment,” Simmons said. “But in a tangible way, it also helps USF students train to do arts outreach.” The students’ poetry will be included in an anthology published by the national Runaway with Words program. Their art will be exhibited at the Thacher Gallery later this year.
Richard Spohn, director of the Leo T. McCarthy Center for Public Service and the Common Good, received $5,000 for planning an Institute for Catholic Social Thought. The money will be used to conduct a feasibility study involving universities across the nation to determine the best way to create such an institute at USF. The institute would likely work closely with USF’s service learning program, sponsor research and scholarship, and host public events. “It would involve the principles of Catholicism, applied to a contemporary context,” said Julia Dowd, coordinator, program developer for the McCarthy Center. “These principles are really rooted in USF’s mission: they can help provide answers to questions on how to make society better.”
Sally Vance-Trembath, assistant professor of theology and religious studies, received $5,000 for developing a new set of Courses in Liturgy. “We want to expand our offerings in the theology department,” Vance-Trembath said. “If we can encourage students to participate in the parish service, either in the choir or (as a) lector, then we can integrate into the program this idea that worship and praying helps people to understand religious traditions more fully.” The courses, which were designed by Associate Director of University Ministry Don Crean, will count for service learning credit and the core theology requirement. Two courses have been designed so far: an introduction to liturgy and a course that focuses on the architecture of St. Ignatius Church.
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