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MCC Daily Tribune Archive

Students Displaced by Hurricane Katrina Join the MCC Family


Five students with extraordinary stories to tell have recently joined the MCC college community. All had their higher education disrupted by Hurricane Katrina. Here are a few of their stories:

Lauren is enrolled at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College in Biloxi, Miss. this fall. She had attended the first week of classes and then was ordered to evacuate. She found her way to Pensacola, Fla., and then Rochester. She is a 2005 graduate of Irondequoit High School.

Robert is studying political science at Southeastern Louisiana University. He found his way to MCC via his father's family who lives in Webster. A Louisiana resident, he's grateful for the warm welcome but a little nervous about our winters. (Snow storms are better than hurricanes, he says.)

Thomas is a pre-med/biology major at Xavier University in New Orleans. He had completed his first week at Xavier but thankfully was visiting friends in Baton Rouge (60 miles from New Orleans) when Katrina hit. He has returned to his Rochester-area home and is making the best use of his fall semester at MCC, Nazareth and the University of Rochester.

Welcome to all the Katrina-displaced students. We are glad you are here.

Cynthia Cooper
Public Affairs
09/08/2005