The 2012 Student Competition Teams

Boston College 

About the 2012 Competition

As part of the Competition, each student team is following a set of guidelines to develop a detailed proposal and budget for a community service project they will undertake during the 2012-2013 academic year.

Working with a faculty advisor from their campus, and at least one outside, non-academic advisor, student teams are competing to develop the most innovative idea for a community service project that will have a concrete, positive social impact upon others, in a way that serves their needs.

To take part in the next stage of the Competition, teams must submit a proposal by April 23, 2012 that follows the Competition requirements and fulfills certain selection criteria. The most competitive proposals will be selected as semi-finalists and become eligible for small grants towards funding their proposed projects. The top finalists in the Competition will be invited to present their project proposals before an independent panel of judges. The top finalists will receive monetary grants to implement their projects during the 2012-2013 academic year.

Giving back: turning values into action

The Next Generation National Student Competition is an outcome of the Got Greek? Project’s Next Generation National Student Research Study, and is made possible by a generous grant from the Zapis Charitable Foundation, along with additional support from the Maliotis Charitable Foundation and the Gerondelis Foundation.

You can join these leaders from our community — and encourage these outstanding students in their efforts to  give back to their communities, turning the values their heritage embodies into action — by showing your support for the the 2012 Next Generation National Student Competition with a donation today to the Next Generation Initiative’s Greeks Give Back Challenge.

Greeks Give Back links

The Greeks Give Back Challenge

The Next Generation National Student Competition

Student Competition Online Application

How to Give Back: Ideas, resources and examples for student projects

Everyone Can Make a Difference: Announcing the Greeks Give Back Challenge

The Got Greek? Project

The Got Greek? Study

In our Master Class with Tom Manatos where he shares his experience working on Capitol Hill, Dana Edwards Manatos talks about what was like to work in the White House for four years during the Bush Administration, and compares it to working in the private sector.

The Next Generation Initiative is seeking a student of Hellenic descent for a Spring 2012 internship in Washington, DC. The intern will work in and out of the Initiative’s Georgetown office to help develop programs that promote youth leadership and help students connect with their heritage, providing administrative and logistical support as needed for program activities related to campus outreach.

Responsibilities:

• Update information on Hellenic American student campus groups;
• Assist with administrative tasks and logistics (identify and reserve venues for events, research flight or hotel options/prices and book arrangements, etc.);
• Make recommendations for program growth and development; and,
• Other duties as assigned.

Qualifications:

• Excellent oral and communication skills
• Knowledge of Microsoft Office Programs
• Fluent in English
• Ability to work on his/her own laptop, including while working from the office
• Undergraduate student or graduate with bachelor’s degree
• Ability to meet deadlines
• Ability to apply discretion and maintain confidential information
• Based in Washington, DC metro area
• Ability to dedicate 4-5 consecutive hours on one weekday per week in the Next Generation Initiative’s office (near M St & 29th St NW, in Georgetown), and up to 5 additional hours per week, flexible scheduling.

If you are interested, please send a résumé and a brief cover letter describing your interest in working with the Next Generation Initiative and your experience to campuscoalition@hellenext.org by February 1, 2012. Qualified candidate will be offered a stipend depending on hours available to work.

Today, on what would have been Martin Luther King Jr.’s 83rd birthday, we are calling on the next generation to honor the courage of all who stand up for others, by serving their neighbors and making a positive impact in their communities — as part of our Greeks Give Back Challenge.

Archbishop Iakovos and Martin Luther King marching at Selma

This LIFE magazine photograph — capturing the historic moment when Archbishop Iakovos joined Martin Luther King, Jr. during the famous civil rights march from Selma, to Montgomery Alabama in March of 1965 — reminds us that everyone can make a difference, and every day is a chance to do so.

Today, on what would have been Dr. King’s 83rd birthday, we are calling on the next generation to honor the courage of all who stand up for others, by serving their neighbors and making a positive impact in their communities — as part of our Greeks Give Back Challenge, a national competition to recognize and reward student achievements in community service. 

March 26, 1965 LIFE magazine cover with Archbishop Iakovos and Martin Luther King, Jr.

“THEY CAME FROM EVERYWHERE — clergymen, nuns, students, doctors, plain Americans, Negro and white — to place themselves by Martin Luther King in the streets, to stand against the police of Alabama in the name of human dignity.  In the turbulent history of civil rights, never had there been such a widespread reaction to the doctrine of white supremacy…  There have been other landmarks in the decades of the Negro’s militancy — at cities like Little Rock and Oxford and Birmingham — but none had the power of Selma in 1965. Here the issue was simple: the right of every citizen to vote. Ironically, Alabama’s inept segregationist Governor George Wallace actually helped the Negroes. It would have cost him little to allow them their peaceful marches. Instead his troopers slashed them down with clubs. At last, this was too much. The nation’s clergy, long hesitant in this area of hunan need, swarmed to Selma.  When one was killed, the nation was further inflamed. Even as [the] memorial service… was held at Selma, rallies sprang up all over the country. Though intransigent Alabama made another brutal show of force, the turning point had clearly arrived in the Negro’s cause.”

The Selma to Montgomery marches were three marches in 1965 that marked the… peak of the American civil rights movement. They grew out of the voting rights movement in Selma, Alabama, launched by local African-Americans who formed the Dallas County Voters League. In 1963, the DCVL and organizers from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee began voter-registration work. When white resistance to Black voter registration proved intractable, the DCVL requested the assistance of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, who brought many prominent civil rights and civic leaders to support voting rights.

The first march took place on March 7, 1965 — “Bloody Sunday” — when 600 civil rights marchers were attacked by state and local police with billy clubs and tear gas. Mounted troopers charged the crowd on horseback.Televised images of the brutal attack presented people with horrifying images of marchers left bloodied and severely injured, and roused support for the U.S. civil rights movement. Amelia Boynton was beaten and gassed nearly to death; her photo appeared on the front page of newspapers and news magazines around the world.

On March 9th, the following Tuesday, Dr. King led about 2,500 marchers out to the Edmund Pettus Bridge and held a short prayer session before turning the marchers back around, thereby obeying the court order preventing them from marching all the way to Montgomery. That evening, three white ministers who had come for the march were attacked and beaten with clubs. The worst injured was James Reeb, a white  Unitarian Universalist minister from Boston. Selma’s public hospital refused to treat Rev. Reeb, who had to be taken to another hospital, two hours away. Reeb died on Thursday, March 11 at University Hospital with his wife by his side.

On March 21, close to 8,000 people assembled at Brown Chapel to commence the third Selma Civil Rights March. Most of the participants were black, but some were white and some were Asian and Latino. Spiritual leaders of multiple races religions and faith marched abreast with Dr. King… Under the terms of Judge Johnson’s order, the march was limited to no more than 300 participants for the two days they were on the two-lane portion of Highway-80… through Lowndes county… At the time of the march, the population of Lowndes County was 81% black and 19% white, but not a single black was registered to vote. At the same time there were 2,240 whites registered to vote in Lowndes County, a figure that represented 118% of the adult white population (in many southern counties of that era it was common practice to retain white voters on the rolls after they died or moved away).

“The end we seek,” King told the crowd, “is a society at peace with itself, a society that can live with its conscience. … I know you are asking today, How long will it take? I come to say to you this afternoon however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long.”

An excerpt of our encounter with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jeffrey Eugenides, who shares some of his thoughts on air travel, college love affairs, advice for beginning writers on being an unpublished author — and how his Greek American background provided rich material for his most successful novels, including his latest, The Marriage Plot, on life after college.

From some of our earlier Master Classes with Tom, we heard a little about he has helped thousands of people find government and political jobs since 2002 — including some of our own next generation students — becoming what Politico Playbook calls “a legend on the Hill for ‘the Tom Manatos jobs list,’ a listserv that started small and is now huge. This is a young man who found a creative way to serve others even before he was a big deal.”

Tom won’t say that he’s a big deal, but we can tell you that this Class will be a big deal for anyone who wants to get in on the best internships. In the best bi-partisan spirit, Tom shares his top tips for snaring the right internship, on or off Capitol Hill, in a very special Master Class with his Manatos Jobs partner (and wife) former Bush White House staffer, Dana Edwards Manatos.

A Master Class with
Tom Manatos
and special guest Dana Edwards Manatos
DNC Headquarters
Capitol Hill
Washington, DC

You can watch the full Master Class online at on livestream — or see an excerpt that features Dana Edwards Manatos talking about what it’s like working in the White House, compared to working in the private sector.

Tom Manatos

Tom Manatos

Tom Manatos is the Senior Advisor to the Chair, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz at the Democratic National Committee (DNC). Tom handles Members of Congress, Senators and elected officials for the Chair of the DNC. Before his position at the DNC, Tom spent over 9 years with Speaker Pelosi both in the Speaker’s office and the Minority Leader’s office. Most recently Tom was the Senior Advisor for Member Services as well as Outreach Advisor for young Americans to Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi. Prior to his duties in the Member Services department, Tom was the National Trip Director and Director of Advance for Speaker Pelosi. Prior to his time with Speaker Pelosi, Tom served as acting Deputy Press Secretary for Senator Paul S. Sarbanes of Maryland and was an advance desk at the Gore/Lieberman national campaign headquarters in Nashville, Tennessee. Tom was born and raised in the Washington, DC area in Bethesda, Maryland and attended Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. He obtained his masters degree in government from Johns Hopkins University in the spring of 2010.

Dana Edwards Manatos

Dana Edwards Manatos

Dana Edwards Manatos began her career with President George W. Bush at The White House in 2003. As Senior Trip Coordinator in the Office of Presidential Advance, Dana was responsible for coordinating and organizing all logistics for Presidential travel both domestically and internationally. In 2005, Dana was promoted to Associate Director of Public Liaison. Her primary responsibility was to highlight the President’s message and participate in ongoing outreach to various constituent groups to create coalitions and gather issue-based support. In August of 2007, Dana resigned from The White House and government service to help run her family’s 93 year-old chocolate business. Today, Dana is the Vice President of Operations for Edward Marc Chocolatier. Dana was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and graduated from Palm Beach Atlantic University with a Bachelors of Science degree in Business Administration.

Highlights from our Master Class at American University with Emmy Award-winning ABC-TV business reporter — and author of the “The College Freshman Survival Guide” — John Spiropoulos. After interviewing hundreds of college students and professors across the country, John knows all the pitfalls, has studied all the angles, collected all the strategies that work — and shared the best of them with us, in the first Master Class in our new “How to Succeed” series.

More than 120 students and special guests joined us at the University of Pennsylvania for this fascinating Master Class with Dr. Roy Vagelos — the legendary retired chairman and CEO of global pharmaceutical giant Merck.

An excerpt from a special Master Class at MIT with Marina Hatsopoulos, the music major turned mechanical engineer who boot-strapped a startup with two other MIT grads and created a company that today makes the world’s fastest 3-d printers. This Class was part of the “Conversation with a CEO” series that included inventor, entrepreneur and founder of high-tech giant Thermo Electron Corporation, Dr. George Hatsopoulos, hosted by CBS White House correspondent Thalia Assuras and introduced by Gov. Michael Dukakis.

An excerpt from a special Master Class at MIT with inventor, entrepreneur and founder of high-tech giant Thermo Electron Corporation, Dr. George Hatsopoulos. This Class was part of a “Conversation with a CEO” series that also featured the next generation of scientist/entrepreneurs, Marina Hatsopoulos, hosted by CBS White House correspondent Thalia Assuras and introduced by Gov. Michael Dukakis.