2008 Horace Mann Award Recipient - Candiss Eickelmann

The Powerful Pull of the Women's Education Project   

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Each Thursday morning at 7 a.m., Candiss Eickelmann arrives at Antioch Seattle when a lot of folks are still sipping their first morning coffee.

Thursday mornings are when the Women's Education Project comes to life on the campus and her volunteer efforts with this program for homeless and formerly homeless women are key to its success.

For seven years now, this 2006 B.A. graduate and Antioch's assistant director of admissions has set up the healthy breakfast and warmly welcomed the women who arrive at Antioch each Thursday at 8:30 a.m. She assists Candace Harris, Antioch core faculty and one of the project's organizers, in providing a friendly, clean and warm place for the women to visit, use the computer lab, join in art projects and more.

In nominating her for the Horace Mann Award, Paul Birney (B.A., 2006) described "the spirited and generous way Candiss has won numerous victories for the Antioch community, her family and humankind."

Ask this single mother of three why she became involved in the Women's Education Project and her initial answer is altruism. "But then," she says, "it became so reciprocal, I couldn't say it was altruism anymore, because I get a lot out of it. More than I give, actually. It's very gratifying and has a powerful pull."

"They know many of us and it's like family."

She describes the homeless woman who told her the project provides the only place where she's treated with respect. Domestic violence and post-traumatic stress are not uncommon in the lives of these women. Some tell her how they value the friendships they've made. Other participants have taken part ever since the project began 10 years ago.

"They know many of us and it's like family," she says, adding, "There is more of a likeness because these are women my age. We have similar histories and background and I often think this really could have been me if I didn't have the support system I had."

On average, 15 to 25 women between the ages of 40 and 70 participate each week. All must be alcohol and drug free. She says younger women, especially those with children, have more services available to them and aren't as likely to participate.

The program is always well attended, she notes, particularly if there's a fifth week in a month and the women are stretched for money and food. For a decade, the project has provided a healthy breakfast, art projects of all sorts, ample opportunities to discuss social issues and two hours of uninterrupted access to computers. Computer access is a big draw, she says, because most public computer access is limited to a half hour.

WHEEL, an advocacy group for homeless women, and The Sisters Project, a nonprofit that serves homeless women, worked with Antioch students, staff and faculty back in 1998 to design a program that would be a long-term success. Mary Lou Finley, Antioch core faculty member, played a central role in developing a vision for the project.

In the project's fourth year, students in the B.A. completion program began to participate for credit. Typically three to six students assist, some as volunteers who don't seek credit, notes Eickelmann, whose own B.A. focused on spiritual studies.

"When Antioch students started to participate, it added another layer and texture to the weave," she describes, adding this is the first year the program has a paid graduate assistant.

The project has developed a couple of annual fund-raising efforts to help sustain it. The B.A. students started a soup and bowl project. Soup is ladled into pottery bowls crafted by the women participants and sold bowl and all. Antioch staff members also stitch quilts and auction them to help with the cost of breakfasts and art supplies.

Both homeless and formerly homeless women are included for a reason, according to the staff recipient of the 2008 Horace Mann Award.

"A lot of the women do find housing, but they still need the support and community they experience at the breakfast because they need some familiar structure when they get their own place," she says.

"Just by being present, it's helpful to them. When we let our expectations fall away and accept the women for who they are at this time, we can feel compassion, appreciate them and meet them where they are. I call it my nitty-gritty soul service."

The project does lead participants to helpful resources, although that's not its primary purpose. She recalls one woman who found housing as a result of her involvement with the project and continues to return every Thursday morning.

Birney said he got to know her when they were both students in the B.A. program. "Over a period of time, I became aware of her deep commitment to social justice exemplified by her work with the women's breakfast.

"Candiss' boundless energy and commitment to the project over seven years is one of the main reasons for its success."

Ulysses Zenon, one of her peers in Enrollment Services, says she is an especially sensitive co-worker who has extraordinary spiritual, emotional and psychological depths, yet shows humility and gratitude.

For example, she decided to include the voices of participants in the Women's Education Project in her acceptance speech for the Horace Mann Award. She asked them to help her write her remarks – another reflection of the generosity of spirit of Candiss Eickelmann.

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