Spring Break
URI campus unites to aid tenants after house fire
Chloe Thompson
Issue date: 4/25/08 Section: News
The last month's rent for their residence was returned, and van Vierssen said she believed insurance would cover the damages done to the house.
"I spoke to one of the girls just the other day, and she said her life was just beginning to get back to normal," Dean of Students Fran Cohen said Monday, three weeks after the incident.
The students needed housing, clean clothing and food. One meeting the morning after the incident with Hattoy's adviser, assistant professor in the school of education Diane Kern, set numerous university departments into motion to assist the girls.
"She's probably the nicest lady I've ever met," Hattoy said.
Kern took the students out to lunch and contacted Cohen, who then e-mailed several departments within Student Affairs, to which Cohen is the assistant vice president.
"They came to campus realizing they couldn't go to classes and didn't know what to do," Kern said. "It really was a blessing to be here when they needed someone."
Kern said before the event, she and Hattoy had had a "normal adviser-advisee relationship," but the experience has brought her closer to all three students.
"I'll certainly be crying at their graduation, I can promise you that. It was really a life -changing experience for all of us," she said.
Cohen recalled the day after the fire. "They still looked like they were smudged with soot, and still going on adrenaline," she said.
Administrators within the departments of Housing and Residential Life, Dining Services, along with the sorority Chi Omega and Health Services, quickly put together what they could to help the girls soon after receiving Cohen's emergency e-mail.
Chip Yensan, director of HRL, said the immediate need was a new home for the students. He said the department looked at the vacancies within housing, with special attention to put the girls in the same room, if not the same building. Yensan said within two hours of receiving Cohen's call, the student's identification cards were activated for their new home, Burnside Hall.
"I spoke to one of the girls just the other day, and she said her life was just beginning to get back to normal," Dean of Students Fran Cohen said Monday, three weeks after the incident.
The students needed housing, clean clothing and food. One meeting the morning after the incident with Hattoy's adviser, assistant professor in the school of education Diane Kern, set numerous university departments into motion to assist the girls.
"She's probably the nicest lady I've ever met," Hattoy said.
Kern took the students out to lunch and contacted Cohen, who then e-mailed several departments within Student Affairs, to which Cohen is the assistant vice president.
"They came to campus realizing they couldn't go to classes and didn't know what to do," Kern said. "It really was a blessing to be here when they needed someone."
Kern said before the event, she and Hattoy had had a "normal adviser-advisee relationship," but the experience has brought her closer to all three students.
"I'll certainly be crying at their graduation, I can promise you that. It was really a life -changing experience for all of us," she said.
Cohen recalled the day after the fire. "They still looked like they were smudged with soot, and still going on adrenaline," she said.
Administrators within the departments of Housing and Residential Life, Dining Services, along with the sorority Chi Omega and Health Services, quickly put together what they could to help the girls soon after receiving Cohen's emergency e-mail.
Chip Yensan, director of HRL, said the immediate need was a new home for the students. He said the department looked at the vacancies within housing, with special attention to put the girls in the same room, if not the same building. Yensan said within two hours of receiving Cohen's call, the student's identification cards were activated for their new home, Burnside Hall.
