Every other week, our Highlanders are using their education to do extraordinary things.
Here, we’ll highlight some notable mentions from local, regional, national and international
news media. Whether our students, alumni, faculty and staff are featured as subject
matter experts in high-profile stories or simply helping make the world a better place,
we’ll feature their stories.
Gift of a lifetime
After her mother’s death in 2009 from liver disease, Blair Hoke ’10 searched for a
way in which she might memorialize her.
An Aug. 12 profile by Cardinal News explains how she ultimately did just that – by donating part of her own liver to
a child in need of a transplant.
Hoke, a mother of two, has worked in professional baseball for a dozen years and is
currently assistant general manager and vice president of ticket sales and service
for the Salem Red Sox.
According to Cardinal News, last September she underwent an eight-hour surgery in
order to help an anonymous pediatric patient. Neither Hoke nor the recipient know
each other’s identity, but Hoke has been told the child “is doing very well,” and
last fall, Diamond Baseball Holdings – which owns minor league franchises that include
the Salem team – presented Hoke with its “Hero Award.”
“I didn't do it for that reason,” she explained in the article. “I want the spotlight
to be more on the education piece of it than my act individually. It gave me the opportunity
to tell more people about organ donation.”
You can read Hoke’s story here.
Volunteer information
Students on break can spend their summer any number of different ways, but Sela Beatty,
a junior who’s double-majoring in communications and psychology, chose to use part
of her time off volunteering with Family Service of Roanoke Valley (FSRV), a private nonprofit organization. Earlier this month, FSRV returned the favor by
giving her a social media shoutout on Facebook and on X, formerly Twitter. Beatty’s work, she said, “gives me a chance to apply what I’m learning in school
in a professional setting.”
Going “Mobile”
“Beans and Rice” started back in the late ’90s as a community outreach project under Nelda K. Pearson,
a former Radford University professor of sociology and anthropology. Twenty-seven
years later, it’s still around and stronger than ever, with offices in Radford and
Pulaski. It offers affordable food, career preparation, loans and, in the wake of
COVID-19, a mobile food market that helps distribute fresh fruits and vegetables.
On Aug. 5, The Roanoke Times documented the history of the New River Valley nonprofit and recounted how the organization
found a way to add its food truck in order to help others.
“Move-in” and groovin’
Last week’s wave of arrivals for Radford’s fall 2024 semester included more than 2,000
new students – which, on a year-to-year basis, represents the largest growth in the
school’s history – and it’s estimated that nearly 3,000 Highlanders are now residing
in on-campus housing. All in all, the move-in was quite an operation, with returning students getting back first and the freshman class hitting the dorms
on Aug. 23.
If you want a sampling of what that was like (without having to apply sunscreen or
being asked to grab the other end of a mini-fridge), you can check out the coverage
by Roanoke’s WFXR-TV, which was picked up by Yahoo.com, or an Aug. 21 package by WDBJ7. This semester’s class also returned to a full line-up of things to do: from now
through most of September, Radford Welcome Weeks offer a slate of more than 110 activities on the main campus and another two dozen in Roanoke.
