students to classrooms and Suffolk students to top research.
is year, the College was informed that its Chemical Dependency Counseling
certificate and associate degree program was awarded $282,353 for the first year of a
three-year grant-funded program that will expand the College’s capacity to train
certified behavioral health paraprofessionals. e College was one of 18 programs
nationally, and the only program in New York State, to receive the Behavioral Health
workforce education and Training for Paraprofessionals (BHweT) grant from the
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health resources and Services
Administration (HrSA). e three-year award will total $847,059, at least 85% of
which will support tuition, fees and supplies for students enrolled in the Chemical
Dependency Counseling program. e project will increase the capacity of the Chem-
ical Dependency Counseling certificate and associate degree program by 71%, to edu-
cate 120 students each year. No other Long island community college program offers
this training. Graduates fulfill all the educational and internship requirements set
forth by the New York State office of Alcohol and Substance Abuse Services (oASAS)
to become a Credentialed Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Counselor Trainee
(CASAC-T) and by the international Credentialing reciprocity Consortium (iCrC)
to be prepared to sit for the Credentialed Alcoholism Substance Abuse Counselor
(CASAC) exam. is program is critical to our region, as youth drug abuse on Long
island continues to rise. in Suffolk County, 11
th
and 12
th
graders reported
that their first drug use occurred at 14.3 years of age, while 7
th
and 8
th
graders reported first using drugs at 11.5 years old (2010-2011 Long
island regional Youth Development Survey). Among the 18,724
individuals served by chemical dependency treatment programs in
Suffolk County in 2012, alcohol was self-identified most often as the primary
drug of abuse (40.5%), followed by heroin (18%).
e College received support from the non-profit American
Association of University women (AAUw) to develop an
innovative program on the eastern Campus to encourage women
to pursue STeM careers. Students interested in learning about STeM careers were
hosted at several events including a visit to Brookhaven National Laboratory where
they met with prominent women scientists and engineers.
other programs around the College benefitted from sponsorships. A SUNY innovative
instruction Technology Grant (iiTG) piloted a mobile maker space in the eastern
Campus library, giving students hands-on access to 3-D printing technology. e
College completed work on the development of a cybersecurity laboratory on the
Ammerman Campus sponsored by the SUNY High Needs grant competition and in
preparation for the launch of a new, two-year A.A.S. degree in cybersecurity. A proposal
submitted to the US Department of Agriculture, in partnership with Auburn Univer-
sity, received $125,000 in funding to develop an educational “virtual Chicken” with
input from graphic design and computer game design students on the eastern Campus.
Last fall, the office of Grants Development hosted a series of three interactive grant-
writing workshops for faculty in Science, Technology, engineering or Math (STeM)
disciplines. ese National Science foundation (NSf) interactive web-Based
workshops (iwBws) were developed for community colleges by the American
Association for the Advancement of Science, Louisiana State University, and NSf.
e workshops are a direct change that was made as a result of assessment findings.
in this case, the office of Grants Development’s Unit review pointed to the need for
significant faculty professional development and support in order to increase the pool
2014-2015 Review of Accomplishments
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