Ellen Rodman
Jackson, Michigan native Ellen Rodman graduated from SVSU in 2005 with a dual degree in Political Science and Communication. She now works in Bay City as an AmeriCorps member with the American Red Cross, East Shoreline Chapter, where she serves in the Disaster and Military Department.
Ellen teaches classes in the community on disaster preparation, helping businesses, individuals, schools and organizations to prepare for everything from house fires to large-scale disasters. She has also been a first-line responder, traveling to Houston, Texas in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and also helps families respond to such small scale disasters as house fires.
Her work with the Red Cross began with an internship while she was still attending classes at SVSU.
“I started in the Health & Safety Division primarily doing direct mail and cold-calling marketing for our various training programs, such as CPR and babysitter’s training, and I eventually became an instructor.”
This work eventually served as the inspiration for an honors thesis, which was titled, “Perceptions of Satisfaction and Preparedness in American Red Cross Training,” which she completed in the Department of Communication under the direction of Professor Amy Pierce.
“I chose SVSU because it is a medium sized school – I would have been completely overwhelmed if I had started out at one of the state’s large schools with over 500 students in a class. SVSU’s small class size is ideal.”
“SVSU has a beautiful campus, and it’s big enough to go for nice long walks around campus, and there are always new people to meet. Even though I had to drive two hours to get to campus, it was definitely worth it.”
“I knew that I wanted to have a career in politics, but couldn’t decide whether I wanted to work on campaigns, lobbying, or in the non-profit sector.”
Ellen also did a stint as an intern in U.S. Senator Carl Levin’s office, where in her words, “I made some of the best contacts in my life, and I am still friends with many of them to this day.”
“The work mainly involved answering phones and talking to constituents. I learned a lot about how to maintain a large database for a U.S. Senator. Every call and piece of mail has to be logged. The experience was invaluable.”
“Also, it was a fantastic education about how the U.S. Senate works – I learned more than you ever could from a textbook.”
Ellen is very active in the area community. She is a member of the Saginaw Democratic Party, where she is helping to ramp up for the 2006 election, and she is involved with the Saginaw Area Democratic Club, where she founded and is Director of the Youth Caucus, a division for 18-35 year old members whose mission is to get young people involved in politics.
“The SVSU Political Science program really teaches you the nuts and bolts of the American political system, but apart from that, the thing I really appreciated was the number of electives I had to choose from. I never felt like I had to take a class I wasn’t interested in.”
“I think my favorite class was ‘Gender and Politics’ taught by Dr. Jesse Donahue. The course readings were fascinating, and covered topics I’ve never had the opportunity to talk about in a class before.”
“The SVSU Political Science faculty is very helpful; they’re the most intelligent people I’ve ever met. Overall, SVSU professors are not uptight in the way kids commonly imagine college professors to be. They have wonderful personalities, and are as fun as they are challenging and inspiring.”