New director brings passion to vacant OCES position

By Samantha Mullin, The Miami Student

One might think that Christie Zwahlen, the new Director of Community Engagement and Service at Miami, has always been involved in community outreach. Not so.

"It's sort of embarrassing, but I was the least engaged undergraduate," Zwahlen said in reference to her time at Stony Brook University, where she graduated cum laude in 2007.

After spending six months volunteering in South Korea, Zwahlen began her Master's program at Binghamton University in Binghamton, NY. It was there that she became involved in community outreach.

"It sort of started to dawn on me," Zwahlen said, "that if I truly feel that these issues are of deep importance, what am I going to do about it? I felt like I had to get out and effect some type of change."

Zwahlen did so by joining AmeriCorps, a federal nonprofit engaging adults in public service work with the goal of meeting critical needs and influencing change in the community. This led to a position with the Center for Civic Engagement at Binghamton, which opened her eyes to the field of community engagement in higher education.

"I had no idea that there were people whose job it was to, every day, work with students to affect change in their communities," Zwahlen said, "It was just amazing. I felt like I had to be a part of this."

Zwahlen started at Miami in the Office of Community Engagement and Service, or OCES for short, in the first week of October. OCES is a resource for students interested in engaging with their communities around issues of public importance. Participation can take all sorts of forms, ranging from one-time volunteer opportunities to more in-depth efforts, such as a semester-long service-learning course.

Zwahlen hopes to spread the word about OCES to students by increasing the scope of information they receive about the center. Next semester, she plans to implement a marketing and social media task force, consisting of one or two student interns and a graduate student to work with the office on taking an innovative approach to reaching out to students.

"My hope is that we will become an information hub on campus for students to find out about all of the various things they can do to get involved," Zwahlen said. "We have so many wonderful things happening all over campus. Community engagement is a way of developing life and also career experience that you may not otherwise have had."

Zwahlen works with Scott Walter, assistant VP of student affairs, on a daily basis to increase participation with the office and create a more civically engaged student body. Walter shares her hope that the office will see more student involvement in the future.

"[I think] service here is making an impact, but sometimes it is so segmented that I'm not sure we are having the impact that we can to really make a difference," Walter said. "If we can have 15,000 students really focus their efforts on an issue they feel strongly about -- whether it be encouraging voting, helping the homeless, or just beautifying Oxford -- then we can really start to see change."

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The position of Director of OCES had been officially vacant for 14 months prior to Zwahlen's hire, a time that the office used to revamp its mission on campus.

University officials agreed that Zwahlen was the best fit to influence the changes and involvement that faculty members hope to see in the future, and she has certainly lived up to this expectation, said Dean of Students Mike Curme.

"Since arriving at Miami, Ms. Zwahlen has only reinforced the very positive impression people had of her through the search process," Curme said in an email. "She is very positive, upbeat, and energetic, and she has quickly embraced our Miami/Oxford and broader communities."

Zwahlen said she's enjoyed her time in Oxford thus far, and admires the history, culture and pride that Miami students and alumni are known for.

"Seeing students on campus in Miami gear and hearing people talk so fondly about their experience with Miami has been incredible," she said.

Zwahlen hopes to help students channel that pride into community service on campus, adding that this type of work can bolster students' professional skills as well as aiding their personal growth. In a time when some may feel overwhelmed by the challenges faced in their communities today, Zwahlen hopes, students will believe that they are capable of making a difference.

"Whatever level of commitment a student is willing to make, or however much time they are able to commit, there is some way that each of us can be making a difference and contributing to causes that are important to us," she said. "[OCES] is the place where you would come to find out about any range of opportunities to enact changes for causes that are important to you."