The Periclean Award is presented each year to a member of Elon's faculty or staff whose service to the broader community exemplifies the ideals of Project Pericles. Elon is one of 10 colleges and universities nationwide to join Project Pericles, an initiative sponsored by the Eugene Lang Foundation, which challenges institutions to provide a learning experience that will "instill in students an abiding and active sense of social responsibility and civic concern."
2008 Winner - Brian Digre
2007 Winner - Jim Pickens
2006 Winner - Richard McBride
2005 Winner - George Troxler
2004 Winner - Rex Waters
2003 Winner - Barbara Taylor
Brian Digre - 2008 Periclean Award Winner
The Periclean Award for Service, as many of you know, was initiated six years ago as part of Elon’s Project Pericles initiative. This award is intended for either a staff or faculty member who demonstrates the values of Project Pericles –a commitment to civic engagement exhibited by their actions. At this time I would like to ask the previous recipients of this award to stand and be recognized.
This year’s recipient is joining some mighty fine company!
We all know how important the Elon Experiences are to an Elon education. The foundation of our work with students is involvement. They want to get their hands on the equipment, work in the lab, engage with community agencies – wherever in the world those communities are.
This year’s recipient certainly fits with this model of engagement. Over the past dozen years, this person has become deeply engaged with a community half way around the world. Building on experience gained long before coming to Elon, while serving as a Peace Corps volunteer, this individual has identified a region’s needs, taught our students about this region, and has encouraged them to invest themselves in deep and meaningful cultural exchanges.
Over the years our awardee and Elon students have raised and donated funds for school development that have resulted in, today, a four-room school building which serves nearly 100 local students. He wrote and secured a grant from Heifer International, along with regional community leaders, to obtain honey bees and to train local people in how to raise them and successfully market the products. And, while the families are waiting for the honey bee colonies to mature and produce, they will receive chickens for immediate income. He has also raised funds for the development of youth recreation programs, and Elon students have donated soccer balls, cash, and uniforms.
One donation project of which many of us are aware is books for the local university library. Picture this – two faculty leaders and 30 Elon students at the check-in counter at JFK airport every January nervously awaiting the weigh-in process for their baggage, knowing that they all have 5-10 books in their suitcases.
Jim Pickens - 2007 Periclean Award Winner
Jim Pickens – Periclean Award The recipient of the Periclean Award for Service this year is a long-time member of the Elon Community. He has not only served as an example to all of us what it means to be a servant to the community but he has been an effective agent of change.
One nominator writes that “he embodies Elon’s core values – personal engagement with students, seeing the global context of our life and work, and service to large communities.”
Another nominator says that “In the tradition of Liberation Theology, he is committed to helping others enter into dialogue with each other, learn to see how things could be different, and become agents of that change.”
His impact has been broad and deep. He has coached soccer, worked with the Boy Scouts, and been active in his church. He has served as a mediator and trainer at the Alamance County Dispute Settlement Center. “From the moment we met,” writes one person, “I was impressed with how much he gave of himself to the larger community. In fact, it was his example that led me to become a regular volunteer at the Allied Churches of Alamance County Emergency Shelter for the Homeless.”
He served as secretary on the Board of Directors for North Carolina Peace Action, and as a member of the NC Peace Action Education Fund. He served as a delegate to Nicaragua and Guatemala on the Witness for Peace Trip in 1991. Upon his return, he began his lengthy relationship with El Centro, has become fluent in Spanish and continues his advocacy for Central America. He has taught English as a second language.
“From a working class background,” writes a colleague, “he is fully aware of the role that education can play in helping others to reflect on their own role in society.” . . . “His strategy is a gentle one. He doesn’t use scorn or forceful rhetoric to make people feel guilty or embarrassed about their own privileged backgrounds.” He uses stories and music to awaken students’ awareness. “He teachers from a perspective of universal respect and empowerment. Everyone has the right to be heard, be treated fairly, be respected, and live life to the best of their abilities. He asks students to think not only about empowering others, but ways in which they can work to empower themselves.”
“He plays folk songs written to support striking coal miners in West Virginia and low paid coffee bean pickers in Nicaragua, and asks students to bring in examples of musical expressions of social issues in their own CD collections.”
For five years he journeyed with students to Guatemala during Winter Term to work with Habitat for Humanity. He made sure that this experience challenged students to see the full context of Guatemala’s Civil War so that they could better understand the circumstances of the Mayan families for whom they were building. And it will surprise no one that in the evening, when energy and spirits sagged, he launched into an old union song that begins, “Step by step, the longest march can be won.”
He coordinated the NEH grant for Peace and Justice Studies that has evolved intoElon’s minor in Non-Violence Studies and is the spiritual father of Elon Students for Peace and Justice.
His hunger for justice, desire for peace, and witness to a better way to be human beings has touched us all.
Richard McBride - 2006 Periclean Award Winner
University Chaplain Richard McBride received the Periclean Award for
Civic Engagement and Social Responsibility at Elon's annual faculty-staff awards luncheon, held Wednesday, May 10 in Koury Center.
McBride has consistently reached out to the campus and local
community since coming to Elon in 1984. He was instrumental in establishing Elon’s Habitat for Humanity chapter and has served as its adviser since 1988. He has encouraged students to take responsibility for raising $30,000 annually to fund new Habitat houses in the local community. He began a Winter Term course that takes students to Guatemala to work with Habitat projects there, and he has accompanied the Elon softball team on a Habitat work trip to Florida.
McBride also created Elon Volunteers!, which has become the Kernodle Center for Service Learning.
A colleague says McBride’s concern for others is genuine.
“It is a joy to watch him care for people in a way that is never charity. He works ‘with’ people and not ‘for’ them or ‘to’ them. It is clear that his belief in service is not just a role in an organization, it is a personal passion.”
McBride has launched numerous campus programs that benefit students. He was active in the establishment of Senior Showcase, which highlights the talents of graduating students, and Hometown Heroes, a program that allows freshmen to recognize someone who made a difference in their lives or in the community. McBride also launched another Elon tradition, the Turning 21 Dinner, giving students the chance to honor an important mentor in their lives as they reach age 21. In 2004, McBride wrote a book, titled "Inventing A Life, The Journey Through College And Beyond," about the changes students experience during college.
McBride has also served the local community through his work with the Alamance County Community Services Agency (ACCSA), where he serves as board chairman. He was responsible for the recent search for a new ACCSA director.
“His commitment to his work is incredible,” writes a colleague. “It would be hard to quantify the hours that he gives to projects like Habitat for Humanity, the local counseling organization, a student in need, a person who needs a hand up. When he is needed, he is there.”
George Troxler - 2005 Periclean Award Winner
On May 11, George Troxler, dean of cultural and special programs, received the Periclean Award for Civic Engagement and Social Responsibility for 2005.
For more than 50 years, Troxler has been actively involved with the Boy Scouts of America. He has been Cub Master of the local Pack 51 since 1975, and became the troop's assistant scoutmaster and district commissioner in 1982. At the Boy Scouts district level, he has held several leadership positions on the Council Executive Board, including vice president of Cub Scouting. He received the prestigious Silver Beaver Award in 1984, which recognizes distinguished service to young people within a Boy Scout local council. He has also received the District Award of Merit for his extraordinary service beyond the local level.
Troxler has been a member of the Boy Scouts' National Camping School Staff for more than 25 years and has been a member of the National Jamboree Staff five times. He is aquatics director at the National Jamboree, which hosts thousands of Boy Scouts from across the country every four years.
As a historian, Troxler has made similar contributions to Alamance County and North Carolina. He served on the organizational board of directors that created the Alamance County Historical Museum and has been an officer of the county historical association since 1971.
Troxler has been an Elon staff member since 1969, when he joined the history department. As dean of cultural and special programs, Troxler coordinates the university's busy schedule of concerts, plays, speakers and convocations. He has served as chief graduation marshal for more than a decade.
He and his wife, Carole, are also active members of Elon Community Church, where he has served as church moderator and deacon.
Rex Waters - 2004 Periclean Award Winner
Rex Waters, assistant dean of students, received the Periclean Award for Civic Engagement and Social Responsibility in 2004.
Waters actively seeks opportunities to combine his work at Elon with service in the local community. Last year, aided by a grant from Project Pericles, Waters organized a summer institute for students at Turrentine Middle School in Burlington. Under his leadership, a group of Elon students worked with 13 Turrentine students, stressing the importance of character, integrity and community service.
Active for many years in the Boy Scouts, Waters is assistant scoutmaster for a troop of more than 40 scouts. He was chosen by district scout leaders to train and lead a group of young men to a scout reservation in 2003.
For more than 10 years, Waters has served as a youth basketball and soccer coach in local recreation and church leagues, demonstrating the values of teamwork and commitment to children. He and his wife, Cynthia, are co-presidents of the Williams High School PTA. They are also active members of Front Street United Methodist Church in Burlington.
Waters fulfills several leadership roles on campus. He mentors students through his involvement in new student orientation, the Student Communications Media Board, Omicron Delta Kappa and Kappa Sigma fraternity.
Barbara Taylor - 2003 Periclean Award Winner
Since 1980, Barbara Taylor, Associate Professor, Computing Sciences has worked closely with CrossRoads Sexual Assault Response and Resource Center in Alamance County. She has committed herself to CrossRoads' mission of supporting people affected by sexual assault, serving on its board of directors, accompanying victims to court or the hospital and working as a fundraiser. She has helped plan and participated in numerous events, including the Human Race for CrossRoads, Take Back the Night and Make a Sundae, Make a Difference.
She has utilized her professional skills to help create a Web site for CrossRoads, design a membership database and, with the help of an Elon student, translate the Web site into Spanish to reach the area's growing Hispanic population.
Her commitment to Elon students has been demonstrated in countless ways. She served as faculty advisor to the student group One in Three from 1993-1997, and assisted with planning and implementing the first Take Back the Night event in 1993. She has also worked as a co-facilitator, helping organize a support group for victims in 1992 that was aided by the involvement of many Elon students.
A colleague who serves on the CrossRoads board of directors says the organization and its members "are consistently motivated and energized by Barbara's selfless spirit, leadership, and dedication to the cause of preventing sexual abuse and serving victims."
