On April 13, the Suffolk community gathered to celebrate the 25th anniversary of its Center for Community Engagement (CCE)—and a commitment to social impact that goes back to the University’s founding.
“As everyday citizens, we shape the communities we live in—it’s up to us,” Adam Westbrook, the center’s director since 2018, told the audience of more than 150 past and current CCE volunteers and staff members, including original founding members like Sherry (Mattson) Noud, MPA ’99, and Kelly Dolan, BA ’00. “Every day, we create the world we want to live in.”
Suffolk President Marisa Kelly said CCE’s focus on the greater good is “essential to Suffolk’s mission, and core to who we have always been as an institution.”
She credited the CCE and SOULS, as the center was originally known (short for Suffolk’s Organization for Uplifting Lives Through Service), with equipping a generation of student volunteers with “the leadership skills and an ethic of service” whose impact is felt not only in Boston, but in communities around the world.
Today, the CCE connects students with close to 80 different community-based organizations and nonprofits, where they address issues ranging from food and housing insecurity to early-childhood education and support for veterans.
Westbrook said one of the things he most values about Suffolk is that “community engagement happens across the institution,” from service learning courses to the Institute for Public Service to the Law School’s many pro bono legal clinics. On average, Suffolk students, staff, and faculty participate in approximately 30,000 hours of service annually.
Answering the call
The CCE’s first Commitment to Service Award was presented to Maura Sullivan, MPA ’10, director of government affairs and health policy for The Arc of Massachusetts, a nonprofit that advocates for children and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, including autism.
In 2019, Sullivan helped pass the Abuse Registry Law (also known as “Nicky’s Law”), a landmark bill that protects people with intellectual and developmental disabilities from known abusers. Today, as part of Professor Sonia Alleyne’s service-learning course, she teaches students how to pursue “social change through a disability policy lens, empowering them to join a disability advocacy movement that truly needs their voices.”
Andrew Gomes—a first-year student and an ambassador with Suffolk Votes, the voter education and registration program—told the audience that college students find themselves at a pivotal moment in their lives when, as young adults, they have the chance to work for real change.
“We’re called to assist our most vulnerable communities and foster an environment of opportunity,” he said. “This is a call that must be answered by all of us.”
