Sitting in the Northeast, the devastation caused by Katrina is unfathomable. I cannot imagine thousands of people dead, and an entire community literally swallowed up by water. My only frame of reference for dealing with such shock and death is having been a Manhattan resident on September 11, 2001. It was the dawn of my senior year of college, and I watched images on television that seemed foreign and terrifying, yet I could simultaneously see the burning, smoking twin towers outside my dorm window. With the hugely destructive hurricane hitting the New Orleans area the week before the Labor Day weekend - the traditional start of American academic years at colleges throughout the country - I began to wonder about the impact on students who were supposed to be moving into the area, while the rest of the South was fleeing as quickly as possible.
More than 100 Tulane University students displaced by Hurricane Katrina arrived at Southern Methodist University Wednesday, including the entire football team.
Anthony Gatt, an international exchange student from Malta, said the first thing he did upon arriving at SMU was take a shower, eat breakfast and contact his family.
"I really needed to get in touch with my family. I needed to make sure that they knew that I was OK," he said. "They were very worried."
About 400 Tulane students originally were evacuated from New Orleans to Jackson State University in Jackson, Miss.
But when the remnants of Katrina struck Mississippi and knocked out power there, school officials decided to send out-of-state and international students to Dallas and Atlanta so they could try to get plane tickets home.
The Dallas contingent of 150 left Jackson Tuesday night and arrived at SMU early Wednesday. Several hundred, mainly international students, were taken to Georgia Tech.
Jim Caswell, SMU's vice president for student affairs, said the students were brought to SMU after he talked about it over the phone with his counterpart at Tulane, a longtime friend.
SMU officials were providing bedding, food, telephones, computers and free airport shuttle services for as long as they were needed, Caswell said.
"They were very tired. They were relieved to find air conditioning," he said. "They had not seen TV. Almost immediately when they arrived at 4 a.m. they were watching the pictures of New Orleans, which made them really upset."
If students have already paid their fall semester tuition to Tulane, Rice will provide available space in classes at no out-of-pocket expense and will work with them to assure they remain eligible for federal financial aid.
Rice and Tulane are both members of the Association of American Universities, the 62 leading research universities in North America, and have significant overlap in undergraduate applications. As a result, Rice will automatically accept into the emergency program any Houston-area undergraduate that Tulane had enrolled.
To help, contact the American Red Cross. You can donate on their web site or over the phone at (800) HELP NOW (435-7669). Donations of cash are far more flexible than in-kind donations and are therefore preferred. The American Red Cross has mobilized thousands of volunteers to respond in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and is sending close to 2,000 volunteers in the area to begin the initial response over the next few days.
misstyrios
NEWSWIRE
Allston, MA
AUG 31, 2005 08:46 PM