Urban communities do not always have a place for their residents to come together. The city of Syracuse does not have that problem.

Offering internships, an art gallery, tutoring, free legal advice and more, the Westcott Community Center, located on the corner of Euclid Avenue and Westcott Street, serves as a resource and activity hub for Syracuse.

Because the center is in a socially diverse neighborhood, it can cater to Syracuse’s spectrum of citizens, said Steve Susman, executive director of the center. Everyone, from toddlers to college students to the elderly, can find a reason to head down to Westcott Street.

That wide range of interests has created off-campus opportunities for students interested in not-for-profit business or art. Syracuse University and Le Moyne College students participate in internships with the nonprofit center every semester, Susman said. Students work in database design, in the art gallery and on lecture committees.

‘A lot of students come to the center for lectures and concerts, and they get more out of the experience if they are the ones choosing who we bring in,’ he said.

Lecturers speak as part of the University Neighbors Lecture Series, which often showcases SU professors. This year, some of the speakers include Goodwin Cooke, a professor emeritus in the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and former U.S. ambassador to countries in the Middle East, Europe and Africa, and George Saunders, an English professor whose work has been published in The New Yorker, Harper’s Bazaar and GQ magazines.

The center also hosts the Second Saturday Concert Series, which has featured SU student band Northbound Traveling Minstrel Jug Band, and will include acts like guitarist and singer Loren Barrigar and Larry Hoyt & the Good Acoustics in January.

‘We try to mix it up and appeal to everyone’s interests,’ Susman said.

The Westcott Community Center further distinguishes itself by offering services unavailable anywhere else in the community. Susman said the most popular program is the free legal advice, in which a lawyer comes into the center to provide legal guidance to members of the community on Thursdays from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

‘Where else are you going to get a free attorney?’ Susman said.

With the center’s expanding budget, an increasing amount of activities has been added since it first opened. Susman said when he started working at the center almost 11 years ago, the yearly budget was $80,000. The center gradually added to its programming through a variety of public and private sources, such as community members’ tax-deductible donations and grants. The budget is now about $700,000. He said close to 50,000 people will take advantage of the programs funded by the budget this year.

‘When we first started, we did very little. We had a couple of after-school programs and some lunch programs,’ he said. ‘Now we have been able to put a lot of the plans we wanted to execute but couldn’t pay for into action.’

The center also offers a range of employment services, helping high school dropouts attain GED certificates and jobs, as well as employing college students through Federal Work-Study programs.

Susman said the center offers specialized classes catered to students’ interests, especially because they do not have to travel far to get to them.

‘Our classes aren’t at the formal university, so they’re more relaxed,’ he said. Students who may want to take a figure-drawing or karate class for fun can do so at the Westcott Community Center, he said.

College students can contribute to the community center through their involvement with local children in the after-school programs.

‘I’m actually getting overloaded with student volunteers for our after-school programs,’ said Shauna Cooper, the after-school program coordinator for the center.

Cooper said student groups from SU come to the center to interact with the younger kids. First Year Players, SU’s amateur theater group for freshmen and transfer students, came to the center to play theater-based games in early October, she said.

She said the program’s funding does not cover teachers who sit down with students and help them with their homework, so student volunteers are especially helpful in the area. Cooper said students from the SU Literacy Corp program, a tutoring service for inner-city children offered by the university, are some people who regularly volunteer.

‘The volunteers usually get along really well with the kids. The kids will see the volunteers coming up and go running up to them,’ she said.

Volunteers also help supervise children in karate classes, in the computer lab and on field trips. Cooper said any student who wants to help Syracuse children and work with them academically and socially is welcome to volunteer.

‘A lot of these kids don’t have role models at home,’ she said, ‘and the student volunteers really help fill that void.’

ertocci@syr.edu

Published on November 3, 2010 at 12:00 pm