For the student leaders planning the event, though, Family Weekend is also providing real-world work experience that will apply outside Fordham’s gates.

In fact for student Rocco Totino, Campus Activities Board (CAB) special events co-chair, and co-leader of Family Weekend, his responsibilities have him so busy that he’s not sure how much he will see his family that weekend.

“My family live near, so I get to see them all the time,” said Totino, a senior in the Gabelli School of Business. “It’s different for my parents to come to Family Weekend, since the whole point is to spend time with your student. I’m so busy running things, that we barely see each other.”

Family Weekend is one of Fordham’s largest student-run events, said Jennifer Lackie, assistant director for student organizations and programming, and the Family Weekend adviser.

Students are responsible for every aspect of the event, from planning the schedule and communicating with parents to working with vendors and event execution during the weekend.

Senior Kiki Jimenez, CAB special events co-chair, and co-leader of Family Weekend, said she feels she has learned skills through planning Family Weekend that will help her when she transitions to the working world.

“I’m definitely learning to take action with things, and speak up if you need to. There’s also a lot of planning,” said Jimenez, a student in Fordham College at Rose Hill.

Planning has been the name of the game for Totino and Jimenez, who have been working since the end of spring semester to organize a fun-filled Family Weekend schedule.

Though the football game, this year against Lafayette College, is always a big draw, Totino and Jimenez said they were excited to add a few new events this year.

This year’s Family Weekend will include a showcase of many of Fordham’s performing arts groups as well as ice-skating on Friday night. The popular “sibling sleepover” has also been enhanced this year with new programs for teenage siblings.

As excited as students are to show off their campus, Fordham parents said they eagerly anticipate the opportunity to see their sons and daughters thriving in their new home.

“You want to see your children, make sure they’re comfortable where they are, and that they have good friends and are part of the community,” said Kathleen Sauer, PAR ’14.

Kathleen and her husband Michael, members of Fordham’s Parents Leadership Council, said Family Weekend provided an opportunity to not only meet their daughter April’s friends, but also their parents.

For sports fan Michael, who keeps up with Fordham athletics via Twitter, the football game was a definite highlight. But he also said he really just enjoyed being on Fordham’s beautiful Rose Hill campus.

“It’s a phenomenal school and a phenomenal campus,” Sauer said. “I wish I could go to school there.”

Lackie said that’s a sentiment she hears from many parents.

“People feel comfortable when they come on campus, that this is a home for them,” Lackie said.

For some families, she said, Family Weekend also serves as confirmation of a good decision.

“Many families find it a very reassuring weekend. They’re happy they sent their son or daughter to Fordham.”

by Jennifer Spencer

The six-week program is a collaboration between the University’s Community Service Program and African and African American Studies Department, and the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB), a nonprofit settlement house that runs a youth enrichment program for college-bound teenagers in the Bronx.

“The curriculum went beyond the traditional subjects that are usually covered in high school and college text books,” said Brian Purnell, Ph.D. (FCRH ’00), adjunct professor of African and African American Studies and research director of the Bronx African-American History Project, who ran the program with the help of Fordham University student mentors. “We examined history from the perspectives of ordinary people: immigrants, workers, and everyday citizens who shape our city each day in innumerable ways. Specifically we sought to unearth the histories of African Americans, Latinos, West Indians and West Africans in the Bronx, to study their communities and cultures and find out how they struggled, survived, and thrived over time.”

History Makers, which began in July, taught Bronx high school students how to perform professional-level historical research in the city’s archives, libraries and museums. The participants worked on the University campus in classrooms and the library, and spent the last week of the program living on campus in a residence hall, to familiarize them with the academic and social aspects of college life.

The students “walked, and walked, and walked and walked quickly,” according to Purnell, on the streets of Morissania, Hunts Point, the Hub and the Grand Concourse sections of the Bronx, exploring the lost history of the borough’s most vibrant African American neighborhoods. The students also visited the Bronx County and Brooklyn Historical Societies, and learned the history of the Brooklyn Bridge and how it changed New York City and immigrant life in the 1900s.

“Dr. Purnell, and the four college mentors, Danielle, Stephanie, Ryan and Laura, put together an incredible program that exposed our participants here tonight to professional-level historical research through various media, visiting museums and archives, going on 100-degree-weather walking tours, lectures, and discussions,” Sandra Lobo-Jost, MSW (FCRH ’97), director of Fordham’s Community Service Program, told the assembled students, family and faculty. “I want to say how very proud we are of Dr. Purnell, the college mentors and all of the participants of the History Makers Program.”

Some artifacts from participants’ research may go on public display at the Bronx County Historical Society or a similar venue. The History Makers program was made possible by a generous grant from the Teagle Foundation. The foundation may fund the program for at least another two years if the University and CAB agree to continue it.

Twenty-three high school participants will work on the University campus in classrooms and the library, and spend the last week of the program living on campus in a residence hall, to familiarize them with the academic and social aspects of college life. The students will also walk the streets of the Morissania section of the Bronx, exploring the lost history of one of the borough’s most vibrant African American neighborhoods; visit the Bronx County and Brooklyn Historical Societies; and learn the history of the Brooklyn Bridge and how it changed New York City and immigrant life in the 1900s.

Having learned how to conduct research using oral history, archival records and analysis of material culture, the students will collaborate in small groups to present their work on some aspect of Bronx history on Thursday, August 3, at 5:30 p.m. in the McGinley Center Faculty Lounge, Rose Hill campus.Following the program’s completion, some artifacts from participants’ research may go on public display at the Bronx County Historical Society or a similar venue.

The History Makers program, made possible by a generous grant from the Teagle Foundation, is a collaboration between the University’s Community Service Program and African and African American Studies Department, and the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB), a nonprofit settlement house that runs a youth enrichment program for college-bound teenagers in the Bronx. The program is run by Brian Purnell, Ph.D., adjunct professor of African and African American Studies and research director of the Bronx African-American History Project, with the help of Fordham University student mentors. The Teagle Foundation may fund the program for at least another two years if the University and CAB agree to continue it.

With more than 400 scholars expected to attend, the congress will offer sessions on methods of reading Chaucer, textual scholarship and manuscript culture, ethics, emotions, and interpretation. Individual sessions will focus on Chaucer’s contemporaries and disciples, Chaucer’s English, late-medieval religious cultures, and the Bible. The conference will also feature keynote lectures by the president of the New Chaucer Society, David Wallace, Ph.D., the Judith Rodin Professor of English, University of Pennsylvania; and Susan Crane, Ph.D., professor of English and comparative literature, Columbia University.

DATE:     THURSDAY, JULY 27 THROUGH MONDAY, JULY 31
PLACE:    LOWENSTEIN CENTER
LINCOLN CENTER CAMPUS
113 WEST 60TH STREET, NEW YORK

See the conference website for registration and information.