University of New England

Three displaced New Orleans college students enroll in UNE for 2005-06

Three New Orleans-area college students displaced from their homes and schools by Hurricane Katrina have recently arrived at the University of New England to live and study through the 2005-06 academic year.

UNE joins colleges and universities around the nation, welcoming thousands of displaced victims of Katrina.

The students are Frank Howard, a senior biology major at Xavier University; Sheldon Franklin, a freshman at the University of New Orleans; and his second cousin, Jennie Gray, a new student at Dillard University.

The University is providing the students with free tuition and free on-campus housing for the academic year. UNE also paid for the students' roundtrip airline tickets, and gave each student money to buy personal supplies.  Sodexho, UNE's contract food service provider, is giving the students free year-long meal plans. And Follett Bookstore is donating all their textbooks for the entire year, as well as giving each student a sophisticated hand-held calculator.

Coordinating UNE's effort to help displaced students is Paul Burlin, Ph.D., interim dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. Burlin is familiar with the New Orleans area, having spent one semester at Dillard College in an undergraduate student exchange program.

"Years ago when I attended Dillard University, the students and faculty there were incredibly warm and welcoming to me," said Burlin. "When this catastrophe hit New Orleans,  I immediately thought of Dillard.  That gave the focus to our offer of help."

Franklin and Gray fled their New Orleans homes to live with family members in Atlanta and attend Morehouse College and Spelman College, respectively. Burlin had contacted both those colleges with UNE's offer. Their parents are unemployed due to the Hurricane's devastation, and at this writing their homes remain underwater. Howard discovered UNE on his own, searching the Internet for an undergraduate program that offered a histology course he needed to apply to dental school. He had never flown in an airplane before this trip.

UNE has also offered to provide a displaced family with rent- and utility-free housing in a small house located on its Westbrook College Campus in Portland, but so far too few evacuees have come this far north to fill all the generous housing offers made by southern Maine residents.

(Press release issued Sept. 26, 2005)