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Onondaga Community College's Box of Books program is in the running for prestigious national honors! Box of Books is one of ten finalists for a Bellwether Award in the category of Instructional Programs and Services. The winner will be announced in February.

The Bellwether College Consortium is comprised of award-winning colleges charged with addressing critical issues facing community colleges through applicable research and the promotion and replication of best practices. The Bellwether Award focuses on cutting-edge, trendsetting programs worthy of replication.

OCC's chapter of international honor society Phi Theta Kappa has had an outstanding fall semester. We'll review some of the highlights in this month's edition of our podcast, "Higher Ed News You Can Use From Onondaga Community College." Our guest is Dr. Annie Tuttle, Faculty Adviser for the chapter. She'll tell us about the annual PTK Project, the Honors In Action effort which benefits women, and what lies ahead in the spring semester. She'll also play "Box of Questions" with us!

• Major: Mathematics & Science
• High School: West Genesee, class of 2018

Anna Gonchar has always known she wanted a career in a field related to the environment. “I grew up four miles away from Onondaga Lake and heard stories about how heavily polluted it was. I was naturally curious to know why it happened and what I could do to improve it. I've always been the ‘nature girl.’ Everyone calls me a tree hugger and I’m fine with that.”

Onondaga Community College student Alyssa Lacomb-Brown began working on a sizable project shortly before Thanksgiving. She was selected to teach students at STEAM at Dr. King Elementary School in Syracuse a song using American Sign Language so they could sign the song during the school's holiday concert. "It was important for them to learn how to sign in case they had a family member or another student who communicated using sign language," she said.

Onondaga Community College welcomes the expansion of the Excelsior Scholarship Program to support the academic aspirations of students across New York State. For first-generation college students in particular, the majority of whom are served by community colleges, college affordability is a significant barrier to degree progression, persistence, and completion. Opportunities to address these barriers through much-needed public investment of grant and scholarship dollars help to address this national concern of students, families, and the institutions that serve them.

The sounds of students hitting ping pong balls could be heard throughout Allyn Hall Gymnasium when it hosted the OCC Table Tennis Club's tournament earlier this month. Sixteen students squared off in the hotly contested competition which was won again by reigning champion Joe Fratianni. Rashawn Sullivan earned second place honors and Joe Ocker finished in third.

Professor Emeritus Ramesh Gaonkar received a pleasant surprise in the mail recently. Gaonkar had retired from OCC in 2010 after spending nearly 40 years teaching Electrical and Computer Engineering Technology. Earlier this year he had applied for a Fulbright Specialist Award. "I wasn't expecting I would be selected because I was competing, primarily, against university research and recognized professors from all over the USA."

Zoe Heyward's story is like that of so many of her Weekend College classmates. She was ready for a career change but between working full time and life responsibilities, college wasn't an option. Onondaga Community College's Weekend College made it possible. "This was something I always wanted to do. For years I had talked to my friends and sisters about it. The experience of returning to school was wonderful. It was stressful and a blessing all in one."