There’s still time for you to be a part of history by being part of the future. Genesee Community College is in the process of choosing items for its 50th Anniversary Time Capsule which will be placed in the Richard C. Call Arena on the college’s Batavia campus. The new facility is currently under construction and is slated for completion this summer.
Donna Rae Sutherland, associate director of marketing communications at GCC, says the deadline for time capsule submissions is March 20, 2017.
This is the first time the college has assembled a time capsule, she says. “The committee will review all submissions and determine if anything is to be eliminated.”
Included will be a variety of GCC memorabilia and other items of interest. Items currently under consideration include a copy of the local newspaper, photographs of the campus and campus events, a postage stamp, a cellular smartphone, a current popular book, magazine or movie flyer, and summarized weather stats for the year.
Sutherland says the college believes the most intriguing and interesting items will be messages from students and faculty of today directed to students and faculty in 2067 when the capsule is opened.
The college invites community members to write messages for submission which answer one or both of the following questions:
What would you tell GCC students and faculty 50 years from now? How has GCC impacted your life and what does the College mean to you?
“We would love to have students, staff and faculty, alumni, retired faculty and staff, and a wide array of community members and stakeholders – from legislators to neighbors, donors and supporters, parents and siblings of our students, etc.,” write messages, Sutherland explains.
The messages should be 200 words or less. Photos or other media smaller than 12 by 12 inches may be included with the message. Send to GCC’s Marketing Communications office at marcom@genesee.edu or drop off at the office in D110. Submissions may also be made via the 50th Anniversary website through the online scrapbook: sunygcc50.genesee.edu/contact.
The Anniversary Steering Committee will select the top submissions to be included in the Time Capsule. All submissions will be displayed at the Alfred C. O’Connell Library during Convocation, September 10 through 23, 2017.
“We have about two dozen items in the box so far,” Sutherland says, “mostly items from the committee at this point.”
The college hopes to hold a special ceremony for placing the time capsule in the new Richard C. Call Arena, Sutherland says, but details are not available at this time.
