Frances Moroney Whited ’44, center,met with her scholarship winners Barry Wygel ’12 and Jenna Chewens ’14.

Chewens is an elementary education major who is active in Mentor Oswego, tutoring middle school students. The daughter of Michael Chewens ’84, she has hopes to volunteer in Africa.
Of her goal to have a career in education, she said, “I’ve known what I’ve wanted to do for a very long time.”

Wygel, who was very active in the Newman Center community before his graduation in May, noted that because of the scholarship he could use more of his time to give back to the Newman Center. “It’s great to meet someone that the Newman Center meant so much to,” he said of Whited.

The Rev. James Lang, former Newman Center chaplain, thanked Whited on behalf of the Syracuse Roman Catholic diocese, saying, “We are grateful for her dedication, not only to Oswego State, but also her vision for the future of the church.”

For more than 20 years, the Newman Center has been the location for the sale. One function of People Against Poverty, a committee of the Newman Center, is to have “students donate their items to us, instead of the dumpster,” longtime volunteer Kathy Brooks Nyman ’74 explained. Fellow alumna Laura Bush Angelina ’70 is also a member of the committee.

“It’s a win-win for everyone,” Director of Campus Life Richard Hughes says. “For students, it gives them somewhere to bring things they no longer have use for, and provides for someone else. It’s good for the college, because it keeps items out of the waste stream.”

The Leave Green program helps the local community and contributes to the college’s participation in climate initiatives, like the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System, or STARS; and the American College and University Presidents’ Climate Commitment, of which President Deborah F. Stanley is a signatory.

Last year, on-campus students donated items directly to the Newman Center, while off-campus students brought 900 pounds of items to the Swetman Gym.

This year, all items will be brought to the gym, sorted, weighed and sold. Items that do not sell will be donated to Catholic Charities’ St. Vincent de Paul store in Oswego. To get involved, contact richard.hughes@oswego.edu.

— Emily Longeretta ’12

The Rev. John F. Hogan Jr. '80 is the new pastor at St. Mary's Church in Oswego.

Fr. Hall baptized young John and, earlier, married his parents, at St. Mary of the Assumption Church in Oswego. Today, Fr. John is marrying couples and baptizing babies in the same church where he began his own spiritual journey. He assumed the role of pastor at St. Mary’s this past summer.

Fr. John wanted to be a priest from the earliest grades. He studied at Wadhams Hall Seminary College and earned his bachelor’s degree in philosophy at SUNY Oswego.

At Oswego’s Newman Center, he worked on the Student Peer Ministry team, under the Rev. Murray Elwood. He still keeps in touch with some of the volunteers, including Kathy Hassey ’81. “It was good for me to be part of a church with people my own age. We could go out and party at Buckland’s but still come to Mass on the weekends,” he says. “The church was important to them, but they weren’t studying to be a priest.”

After Oswego, he entered Christ the King Seminary and worked for two years as a victim advocate for the U. S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, D.C.

He was ordained in 1988 after earning his master’s in divinity, and served in several parishes. While at St. Charles Borromeo in Westvale, he was lucky enough to reconnect with Fr. Hall, who was retired but volunteered at the parish.

With the pastorship at St. Mary’s, Fr. John has come full circle, serving the people he grew up with, including his parents and brother. Now visitors to the parish rectory are greeted by Fr. John’s 2 1/2-year-old Shetland Sheepdog, Tavis.