Jerome Boettcher

Groundswell partners with Mason LIFE providing scholarships, internships, and career services

Colleen Rich — Thu, 12 Sep 2024 19:46:30 +0000

Groundswell partners with Mason LIFE providing scholarships, internships, and career services Colleen Rich Thu, 09/12/2024 - 15:46

As with most internships, information technology consultant Groundswell aims to provide an experience that gives ��AV students a chance to learn about the company, delve into new areas and discover more about the industry.

Photo provided

Over the 2023-24 school year, Mason LIFE student Mohammad Nadeem did just that through his internship with McLean-based Groundswell, learning about data analytics, software development, and physical hardware.

“We wanted to ensure that we maximized his opportunities to grow as an individual,” said Tim Kelly, vice president for operational excellence for the People Services team at Groundswell. “We wanted meaningful work for him. We wanted him to try different things.”

Like destroying a laptop.

Nadeem strapped on safety goggles, wielded a hammer, and broke open laptops. Kelly said Nadeem was educated on the intricacies of removing critical components for recycling and security purposes. Over time Nadeem discovered patterns, learned how to make repairs and extract components in different devices.

“He absolutely loved it,” Mason LIFE Employment and Adult Services Coordinator Chris Williams said. “He was exposed to different things, and it offered professional building. He really enjoyed the atmosphere. Just working with others and just being treated as part of the team was valuable for him.”

“I made some friends over there,” said Nadeem of his time at Groundswell. “I would like to go back and work there. The boss is very nice.”

Nadeem will graduate next spring from the College of Education and Human Development’s (CEHD) Mason LIFE program, a four-year post-secondary comprehensive transition program for young adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities who desire a university experience in a supportive academic environment. Mason LIFE students regularly complete internships, working in a wide range of settings, including at software companies, George Mason rec centers, Fairfax County Public Schools, and animal care facilities.

Williams said Nadeem’s experience with Groundswell boosted his confidence and independence. He drove independently from his parents’ home in Alexandria to McLean twice a week for the internship. Mason LIFE also provided support staff in to be on-site at Groundswell with Nadeem, but Kelly said as the internship progressed, “it became far less, less of them guiding him.”

“It has a huge impact. The internship experiences are critical,” Williams said. “The students are learning the importance of going to work on time. Knowing they have duties and responsibilities assigned to them that they have to complete. Working with others. Receiving feedback from their employers. Students are also learning what they like, what they don’t like.

“They were thrilled to have Mohammad. They enjoyed that they pushed him. They really appreciated that whatever they assigned Mohammad he gave 100% effort and he tried his best.”

One of those assignments, Kelly said, contributed to Groundswell winning a major environmental award. Nadeem performed analysis over several weeks to calculate the environmental impact Groundswell employees had made due to a company-wide emphasis on telecommuting.

Through the Groundswell TTRIP (Transit and Telework Resources, Impactful Practices) Program, Nadeem found that Groundswell employees in 2023 saved 49,918 gallons of gas and 24,312 trips to the office, among other notable data points.

“He became an integral part of our team,” Kelly said. “I was really proud of him. To see his confidence, see his joy, seeing him understanding the impact of the work for the company and really add value and do meaningful work.”

Kelly has been so impressed with the partnership with Mason LIFE that Groundswell recently announced the creation of scholarships for Mason LIFE students.

In addition, Groundswell wants to continue helping Mason LIFE students in their career development. This past April, Kelly and several Groundswell employees visited CEHD and facilitated an “Introduction to Work 101” workshop.

A photographer took headshots of each of the 16 Mason LIFE students who attended. Kelly and his team helped the students set up LinkedIn accounts, creating their bios and providing dos and don’ts for social media. Williams and Kelly both hope to make the workshop a semiannual career development event for Mason LIFE students.

Williams said it was truly a really great day. “To be able to hear from a professional workplace outside of the Mason community was really impactful and resonated with the students.”

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Students

internships

Mason LIFE Program

Workforce Development

Behrmanns add to legacy with creation of undergraduate scholarship for special education program

Colleen Rich — Fri, 26 Jul 2024 14:52:21 +0000

Behrmanns add to legacy with creation of undergraduate scholarship for special education program Colleen Rich Fri, 07/26/2024 - 10:52

Year in and year out, ��AV’s special education graduate program ranks as one of the best in the nation.

June and Mike Behrmann. Photo provided

In the latest U.S. News & World Report rankings of online master’s degree programs, George Mason’s special education program ranked eighth in the country. In 2023, the special education graduate program ranked 17th in the country among public institutions and 19th overall.

Pamela Baker, the Special Education Division Director, points to one man for laying the foundation for a program that consistently produces quality teachers—Michael Behrmann.

“He is kind of a legend here,” Baker said. “He built the special education program.”

Seven years after retiring from a nearly 40-year career in the special education program that included serving as division director prior to Baker's tenure in that role, Behrmann, now professor emeritus of special education, continues to add to his legacy.

Behrmann, along with his wife, June, has generously created an undergraduate scholarship for George Mason students in the special education program. The undergraduate special education program, which was created in 2019 along with bachelor’s degrees in elementary education and early childhood education for diverse learners, aims to tighten the nationwide teacher shortage gap.

Students who plan to teach may focus their program on a specific area in the special education field by adding a licensure concentration—K-12 adaptive curriculum, K-12 general curriculum licensure or PK-12 blindness and visual impairments licensure—or pursue a nonlicensure concentration.

“Children with special needs are our most vulnerable students. We need more teachers working with this population of students,” Behrmann said. “Undergraduate programs are one way that can be really addressed and start to bite into that shortage of qualified teachers.”

Behrmann arrived at Mason in 1979 as the coordinator of the special education graduate program, which had just three faculty members and a small handful of graduate students.

Over the next four decades, the program grew as Behrmann secured more than $90 million in external grants and contracts, $30 million in revenue-based projects, and $4.5 million in gifts for special education to the university. In the mid 1980s, he also designed and implemented a master’s and a doctoral program in assistive/special education technology.

The special education program now enrolls more than 1,000 students annually and employs more than 150, which includes faculty, staff, graduate assistants, and student workers.

“I consider the faculty who are at George Mason now as my legacy,” Behrmann said. “Master’s and doctoral students who are now faculty members. They are such great researchers and trainers. Pam and that whole crew of special educators are just tremendous.”

Behrmann wants the scholarship to support special education undergraduate students who are working with the Mason LIFE Program, a four-year postsecondary comprehensive transition program for young adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities who desire a university experience in a supportive academic environment.

When Behrmann founded the Mason LIFE program in 2005, his vision was twofold. He wanted to provide an educational, on-campus experience for students with disabilities. But he also wanted to offer Mason graduate and doctoral students—and now undergraduate students—working in the Mason LIFE program an opportunity to attain hands-on special education experience while also pursuing their degree.

The Mason LIFE program, currently led by director Linn Jorgenson, enrolls around 50 students every year, with 18 freshmen admitted for the 2024-25 school year.

“At the time, it was one of only one or two programs in the whole United States,” Behrmann said. “They have spun off, with federal support, and are much more common across the country. Seeing that program continue to be supported, within the diversity of the university, really makes me proud. All the university presidents from Alan Merten to current president Gregory Washington have been great supporters of the Mason LIFE Program.”

“It is a program that affirms our mission,” Baker said. “We are here to make a positive impact on the lives of people who have disabilities. These young adults are integrated into the fabric of the university. They come back as alumni. Our Mason LIFE students have been in the Green Machine band. They have been cheerleaders. They are all over the campus. Mike had the vision.”

The Behrmanns met when they were both teaching in Cincinnati. June then spent more than 20 years as a writer specializing in special education issues before returning to the classroom as a special education teacher for Fairfax County Public Schools. Now they want to help ensure that George Mason’s undergraduate program shapes the next generation of special education teachers.

“If we can give this [undergraduate] program the kind of marketing it needs, support more students, it has real potential to grow into a large scholarship program,” Behrmann said. “The special education program is one of the strongest programs in the university, and I’m excited to see it continue to grow.”

The Behrmanns encourage graduates of the special education programs and certificate programs to get involved personally and give back to the scholarship fund. To make a gift, click here.

“He is kind of a legend here,” Baker said. “He built the special education program.”

Learn more about George Mason's Special Education Graduate Program

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Campus News

Mason Now: Power the Possible

College of Education and Human Development

Mason LIFE Program

Scholarships

Mason alumna gets her close-up with the president

Colleen Rich — Thu, 21 Jan 2021 22:36:58 +0000

Mason alumna gets her close-up with the president Colleen Rich Thu, 01/21/2021 - 17:36

Mason alumna Ariana Freeman (far left) worked in the Capitol Rotunda during the 59th presidential inauguration as a broadcast associate for CBS Evening News. Photo provided

When 4:45 a.m. came and went and her Uber hadn’t shown up, Ariana Freeman shook off her heels, strapped on a pair of boots and hoofed it 30 minutes to the U.S. Capitol.

Nothing was going to stop the ��AV alumna from covering her first presidential inauguration. Freeman spent the day inside the Capitol Rotunda reporting as a broadcast associate for CBS Evening News.

“It was absolutely amazing and I’m just so thankful I got to go,” Freeman said. “I was taking it all in.”

Ariana Freeman

On Wednesday, her job consisted of working with the pool camera from NBC to inform her senior producer of key happenings behind the scene. When she saw President Joe Biden coming down the hallway, she alerted her producer to get ready to roll the rotunda camera in five seconds.

“You see the gifts presentation but, hey, you might have missed [Vice President] Kamala Harris just winked at Sen. Amy Klobuchar,” Freeman said. “Giving that color, those details that the viewers and correspondents don’t see, pretty much that was my job—to catch them coming in, coming out, make sure our cameras were rolling.”

Two years ago, Freeman couldn’t have imagined herself working in politics, let alone covering the 59th presidential inauguration. The former collegiate women’s basketball player always thought she’d end up working in sports, possibly as a sideline reporter.

Her master’s degree, after all, was in sport and recreation studies with a concentration in sport management. She freelanced with the Washington Football Team’s Charitable Foundation in addition to serving as a features reporter for ESPN+ broadcasts of George Mason men’s and women’s basketball games.

But as she finished graduate school in 2019, she ran into a former basketball coach at her alma mater, St. Paul VI Catholic High School in Fairfax. He suggested she reach out to a friend of his, Jan Crawford, who served as a political and legal correspondent for CBS News. Hesitant at first to venture into politics, she agreed to shadow at CBS News for a day.

“The moment I walked into CBS News… I think I just loved the energy I felt,” she said.

By the end of the day, the Washington bureau chief offered her a position as a news associate, essentially an internship position. Two full-time promotions and two years later, she’s covered press conferences at the White House, was inside the Senate chamber for the 2020 impeachment trial of President Trump and reported on breaking news such as the deadly shooting in a Virginia Beach municipal building. Freeman currently works daily with CBS Evening News host Norah O’Donnell to ensure her script and broadcast is accurate.

“I’m so new into news that I’m still learning,” Freeman said. “It is definitely way different than sports, but it is just so rewarding. Politics just promote that change I want to see.”

Freeman, who received her bachelor’s degree in journalism at the University of Colorado, credits her professors at Mason for emphasizing the power of networking. She also said the sport management program stressed elements that transcended sports, such as finding “little nuggets and a different way to tell a story.”

“Some people just have that drive,” said Sport and Recreation Studies Associate Professor Pierre Rodgers, who was Freeman’s advisor. “Ariana always had a plan to do what she was going to do. She was going to be great no matter where she went.”

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Mason alumna blazing a trail for women in the NFL

Colleen Rich — Wed, 13 Jan 2021 21:26:32 +0000

Mason alumna blazing a trail for women in the NFL Colleen Rich Wed, 01/13/2021 - 16:26

Callie Brownson. Photo courtesy of the Cleveland Browns.

��AV alumna Callie Brownson and her boss, Cleveland Browns head coach Kevin Stefanski, often joke that there is no job description for her role as the team’s chief of staff.

“It’s an anything and everything role,” said Brownson, who received her bachelor’s degree with a concentration in sport management from the College of Education and Human Development in 2016. “Basically, how we operate as a team runs through me. I kind of enjoy the challenge that no day is the same.”

While her job as chief of staff—the first female to hold the position in the NFL—usually pertains to logistics, operation, and organizing practice plans, Brownson has been a “utility player” for the Browns during an unprecedented season that continues Sunday in a playoff matchup against the defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs. Most recently, she has put on a headset and fulfilled her true passion—coaching.

During three games this season, Brownson has filled in as a position coach for a Browns’ coaching staff dealing with positive COVID tests. On Jan. 9, she coached the tight ends during the Browns’ upset of Pittsburgh in a wild card playoff game, the franchise’s first postseason victory in 26 years.

The Alexandria native also coached the tight ends on Nov. 29 in a victory over Jacksonville, becoming the first woman to coach a position in an NFL regular-season game. The sideline jacket she wore that day and an autographed game ball sit in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Earlier in the season, she joined Washington Football Team coaching intern Jennifer King and game official Sarah Thomas in the first NFL game with a female official and female coaches on both teams.

“It’s really special what’s happening in the league,” said Brownson, who is in her first year with the Browns after serving as a full-time intern with the Buffalo Bills last season. “I think it’s a really cool time for women to see all these possibilities and all these barriers breaking.”

Mason sport management instructor Charley Casserly, a longtime NFL executive who won three Super Bowls with the Washington Football Team, recalled Brownson’s ambition and drive.

While pursuing her degree at Mason, Brownson was also playing football for the D.C. Divas—Washington’s professional female football team—and coaching softball and football at her alma mater, Mount Vernon High School.

“When they are already working on their life’s goals when they are still in college, those are the ones that are most successful,” Casserly said. “It was just a question of where she was going to be successful.”

Brownson said Casserly’s advice to “take advantage of every opportunity to get in front of people” has always stuck with her, whether she was at Mount Vernon, working a scouting internship with the New York Jets or on Buddy Teevens’ staff at Dartmouth as the first female full-time Division I football coach.

Brownson said the smaller size of Mason’s sport management program and having multiple classes with faculty such as Professor Robert Baker and Associate Professor Craig Esherick helped sharpen her skills, narrow her career direction and develop a plan to reach those goals.

“Ending up at that program was such a stepping stone,” she said. “The involvement and push: ‘What is your plan? How are you going to do it?’ That is extremely rewarding. It’s really special.”

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Students

Campus News

Alumni

College of Education and Human Development

sport management

Jerome Boettcher

Groundswell partners with Mason LIFE providing scholarships, internships, and career services

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