Following her Passion for Helping Those in Need
Posted: September 18, 2009
)
Julie Shiller (center) holds the citation that was read when she was presented with her award. She is joined by Provost Lynn Pasquerella and Hillyer College Dean David Goldenberg.
)
Julie Shiller (center) with (l-r) her father, Stephen Shiller; mother, Joan Shiller; brother, Jonathan Shiller; and Hillyer College Dean David Goldenberg.
)
First-year Hillyer College students Hattie Derderian (left) and Atticus Diamon talked to Shiller (center) after the award ceremony.
As a member of the AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps, she has rebuilt homes for Hurricane Katrina victims and cleaned out houses in the Midwest that were ravaged by floods; set up emergency shelters and distributed supplies to hurricane survivors in Texas; and helped victims of devastating wildfires in Florida. And that’s just the beginning for Shiller, who plans to make it her life’s work to help those in need.
On Tuesday (Sept. 15), Hillyer College presented Shiller with its fifth annual Outstanding Young Alumnus Award at a ceremony in Wilde Auditorium.
“We honor her today in appreciation of the power of a single person – one woman – to create hope when surrounded by those who feel hopelessness,” Hillyer College Dean David Goldenberg said in presenting the award to Shiller. “She is an inspiration to an institution that prides itself in being a ‘private university with a public purpose.’ ”
It’s not a role that Shiller would have envisioned for herself when she was in high school. Speaking to an audience of Hillyer College students, faculty, and friends and family members, Shiller said that she “did not respond well to mainstream teaching methods,” and as a result, struggled to graduate from high school.
In 2003 she entered Hillyer College, and the individual attention, caring and supportive faculty, and unique approach to learning that she found at Hillyer changed everything, Shiller said. She not only became more thoughtful, inquisitive, and hungry for knowledge, but discovered that she had a passion for community service, social justice and activism.
Shiller earned her associate’s degree from Hillyer in 2005, and went on to major in sociology and gender studies in the College of Arts and Sciences. In the spring of 2006, with the encouragement of many of her former Hillyer professors, she spent a life-changing semester in Cape Town, South Africa, where she studied, volunteered, and applied the knowledge she gained in the classroom "to social problems in the real world."
In 2007, Shiller graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor’s degree from the University of Hartford. With guidance once again from her former Hillyer professors, she decided to join the AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps and follow her passion for helping people in need. The work was grueling but the people she met and her experiences responding to disasters will be with her for the rest of her life, Shiller said.
After finishing her 10-month stint with AmeriCorps, Shiller moved to Colorado and began work as a counselor at a group home in Denver. “My clients, all non-verbal and developmentally and physically disabled, have inspired me in a similar way to that of the Hillyer faculty,” Shiller said. “Both groups have taught me in an equally thoughtful way that service learning, social justice, and social work is where my heart is.”
This past Thursday – just two days after receiving her Outstanding Young Alumnus Award – Shiller began a new chapter in her life, as a student at the University of Denver’s Graduate School of Social Work.
Shiller’s story was especially inspiring to the first-year Hillyer College students who heard her speak on Tuesday. “From this point forward,” Shiller told them, “Hillyer will provide each and every student here with a clean slate: an opportunity to truly find where your hearts are, and all the resources necessary to achieve your goals.”
More News and Events