Staff Profile
Robert Hackett
From the Heart of The Bonner Foundation: Elaine ...

In celebration of Elaine Wheeler's retirement, we honor her invaluable contribution to the Bonner Foundation. Her commitment and mentorship have been instrumental in our growth as a Foundation and the Network we have today. As she embarks on her retirement, we celebrate her legacy of dedication and look forward to the path she has paved for us.

From the Heart of The Bonner Foundation: Elaine Wheeler's Retirement Celebration
Robert Hackett
Announcing the Refreshed Bonner Wiki

With over three decades sharing campus examples, guides, and documents to download, the Bonner Foundation is excited to announce a recently updated Bonner Resources Wiki.

This summer, the five National Bonner Summer Interns at the Foundation — Anu Baskar (George Mason ‘24), Camila Guayasamin (The College of New Jersey ‘24), Dominique Dore (University of Houston ‘22), Mikaela Chin (High Point University ‘24) and Selah Ndouta (Capital University ‘22) — worked with the Foundation staff to refresh the look of the wiki’s homepage and, more importantly, update campus examples and other documents.

They devoted particularly attention to the Bonner Program Management and Community-Engaged Learning sections. In addition, Mikaela and Dominique also created a short video on how to navigate this wealth of knowledge.

Announcing the Refreshed Bonner Wiki

Community Partner

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Summer Freedom Holds Different Meaning for Davidson Students

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Summer Freedom Holds Different Meaning for Davidson Students

Three Bonner Scholars from Davidson engaged with the Freedom School this summer, as profiled in this Davidson.edu article.

TJ Elliott, linebacker and sociology major, has developed a new appreciation for teachers.

He’d worked with kids as a summer camp counselor, a tutor, and football coach for his little brother’s Pop Warner team. Teaching as a Freedom Schools servant leader intern this summer opened a new view.

Leading a classroom of energetic six to eight-year-olds every day – with a mission to improve their literacy skills – kept the Davidson College class of ’21 football player and Bonner Scholar from Charlotte playing a nimble mix of defense and offense.

President Carol Quillen participates in Freedom Schools' Harambee.

“I always thought it was about managing the class and helping kids redirect their behavior when they need that,” said Elliott, of Charlotte. “I wasn’t thinking about making lesson plans and all the preparation involved. It made me realize that we don’t pay teachers nearly enough.”

Partnering with Local Organizations Shifts Senior's Perspective from Global to Local

Partnering with Local Organizations Shifts Senior's Perspective from Global to Local

Four years ago, when Regina Cavada, ’16, left San Diego for Richmond and began her freshman year at the University of Richmond, her path seemed obvious.

“I was really interested in international issues,” she says, “I knew that was where I wanted to be.”

Cavada naturally chose an international studies major and spent her freshman year studying Arabic. She complemented her interests by partnering with World Pediatric Project as a Bonner Scholar — a program that pairs students with local organizations for four years of sustained community engagement and social justice education.

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Davidson Bonner's Selfless Embrace of Community Causes Garners Statewide Recognition

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Davidson Bonner's Selfless Embrace of Community Causes Garners Statewide Recognition

Davidson Senior Melodie Mendez is among 17 North Carolina student winners of the 2012 "Community Impact Award" from Campus Compact, a national coalition that promotes civic engagement in higher education. The award was announced just days before she was also named as senior class recipient of the college's Goodwin-Exxon award for high standards of character, friendliness and consideration for others.

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Maryville Bonner Makes a Difference Among Special-Needs Adults

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Maryville Bonner Makes a Difference Among Special-Needs Adults

At first, Elizabeth Dunn wondered how in the world she could fit community service into her college schedule.

Now she wonders how in the world she could have ignored her volunteer spirit.

Dunn, a first-year student at Maryville College, is a Bonner Scholar. In exchange for scholarship dollars, she volunteers at least 40 hours monthly at the Gateway to Independence, a local non-profit agency whose mission is to help young adults with disabilities to achieve independence by providing them with vocational training and social activities.

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Full Circle: Guilford Connections with Refugee Communities

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Full Circle: Guilford Connections with Refugee Communities

Experiential learning through community engagement is a long term investment. Sometimes the payoff takes decades because Guilford College's stewardship is built on the idea that some good things can't be measured by quarterly returns or academic semesters. Bonner Center for Community Service and Learning and its student coordinators and teams of student volunteers have run some community sites for years, long enough for refugee and immigrant children who were tutored by Guilfordians to have grown up ready for college themselves.

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Guilford Attends N.C. Heritage Awards Ceremony

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Guilford Attends N.C. Heritage Awards Ceremony

The 2016 North Carolina Heritage Awards recognized traditional backstrap weavers H Ju Nie and H Ngach Rahlan, who are Bonner Center community partners.

Since both Greensboro weavers are elderly, Bonner Center Volunteer Training Coordinator Andrew Young and his wife, Betsy Renfrew, herself a weaving expert, accompanied the artists to the North Carolina Executive Mansion for dinner May 24 with Gov. Pat McCrory, N.C. Department of Natural & Cultural Resources Secretary Susan Kluttz, and N.C. Arts Council Executive Director Wayne Martin.

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Bonner Scholars Assist with Carnival in McDowell County, West Virginia

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Bonner Scholars Assist with Carnival in McDowell County, West Virginia

Being born and raised in Tazewell County in Southwest Virginia, I know first-hand the struggles and challenges that living in a coal mining community can have on every aspect of human life.

A nearby town in McDowell County, W. Va., also knows the challenges of this lifestyle all too well. War, a once booming coal mining town and the place to go in the 1940s, is now a ghost town due to the trickle-down effect of losing the major economic sector of the community.

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A Hunger to Help

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A Hunger to Help

Not long after Helen Mandalinic ’14 arrived at Guilford in 2010, she began volunteering with the Community Kitchens Project, a program that packages cafeteria leftovers into meals and delivers those meals to the area’s needy.

She quickly realized her passion for service didn’t need to be put on hold for her studies, and her education at Guilford would extend beyond the classroom and the campus.

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Public Policy Site Debuts as Resource for Community

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Public Policy Site Debuts as Resource for Community

     People in the Davidson area and beyond who are interested in public policy now have a great new resource, thanks to the college's Bonner Scholars. The Bonner Scholars recently unveiled their latest project–a comprehensive website called PolicyOptions.org focused on bringing together in one place information regarding public policy, policy changes and social services.
     Naomi Coffman '16 and Rashaun Bennett '16 are the Bonners primarily responsible for keeping the website up to date.
     The project began at Davidson in the fall of 2013. Kristin Booher of the Center for Civic Engagement office encouraged Coffman, along with Zoe Williams '14 and Philip Yu '16, to get involved, and Coffman immediately saw the potential.