Medgar Evers Quartet Honored At Women’s History Month Opening Ceremony
On March 8, the Founder’s Auditorium was where the Women’s History Month Committee shone the spotlight on four Medgar Evers College Honorees—Lisa Anderson, Tania Garcia, Laura James, and Amani Reece. The foursome were given the nod for their contributions to the MEC community.
Lisa Anderson
Having served under four presidents at Medgar Evers College for the past 36 years, Lisa Anderson has seen it all in a job that requires her to maintain Dr. Patricia Ramsey’s schedule in addition to riding herd on all the operations that come out of the president’s office. The Queens native is a proud Medgar Evers College alum who earned her associate’s degree in computer applications and finished up with a baccalaureate in business and professional studies. An avowed film fan who counts Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Leonardo DiCaprio among her favorites Anderson uses “…the quiet time of movie-watching where you not supposed to talk or move around…” to recuperate from the hectic nature of her work. Still in all, she’s quick to point out, “I enjoy what I do. I come to work and I have fun.”
Amani Reece
As the Medgar Evers College Director of Student Life and Development, Amani Reece uses a four-pronged approach to build out and create engagement for the MEC student body. Campus-wide programs and events, leadership development and training, diversity and inclusion initiatives, and community engagement and volunteerism initiatives are the tent poles for Reece’s role in helping shape young minds. A MEC alumni (Class of ’07), Reece has always been deeply involved in education dating back to her substitute teaching twelfth-graders as an 18-year-old at the local technical institute in her native Guyana. After a four-and-a-half-year at Hunter College as a student activities coordinator she returned to MEC in 2011. The disruption caused by the pandemic was difficult for Reece to navigate but she’s grateful that the school is returning to a sense of normalcy.
“I think it hit me hard when I was pulled away from the students,” she recalled. “I had a difficult time coping with that and figuring out these different ways to engage students. It’s where I’m comfortable. It comes naturally and there is so much you learn from students. We often think we’re the teachers but the things I’ve learned in humanity, compassion and leadership—if we take our time to engage students there is so much we learn from them along the way that will help build you. It’s really fulfilling especially when you have those moments. At the end of the day when you look back and you see that student walk across that stage you feel like you had a little something to do with that.”
Laura James
Giving back is at the heart of what drives Laura James. It’s an important component of the native Panamanian’s role as the MEC Senior Summer Youth Employment Director. Through her office, James and her 14-person staff help roughly 1,500 youths find jobs through partnerships with a number of organizations ranging from the Kings County Supreme Court, the MTA, and Kings County Hospital to businesses in South Carolina and Illinois. James has been at MEC for a quarter century and during her time here she’s derived a deep amount of satisfaction from the success she’s seen MEC alumni achieve through her department’s efforts.
“The most rewarding part of my job is when a young person completes the program and other work sites or supervisors hire them after the program has ended,” she explained. “People are observing them and meet them, so they do hire them. We also hire some of the staff that has been productive. It becomes that we are assisting our community. Some of my staff right now were summer interns who have grown with us and now they’re full-time on our staff.”
Tania Garcia
