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Spring Finals Week: Writers' Block sessions are available throughout finals week. Summer 2025: Writers' Block sessions will be available throughout the Summer Sessions on Teams.

Spring moves as quick as a warm breeze in the North Country and as the world wakes up, there’s always something new. It feels like one day the snow is still disappearing and the next, the frogs are hopping and insects hang in the air on gauzy wings. With buds and flowers popping and animals afoot after the winter months, it’s hard not to feel the call. So cut yourself a little slack.

Sprinting up the court on a fast break, Jakia Howard ’24 looks for a lane to the basket. The defense tries to double-team her, but her teammate sets a screen, and Howard drives inside for a layup.

Sprouting from a strong educational foundation in language and culture within SUNY Potsdam’s Department of Modern Languages, Meghan Sullivan ’11 launched a career with the United Nations World Food Programme—humanitarian work focused on food insecurity issues in Haiti, where 4.6 million people (40 % of the population) are desperately in need of assistance.

Standing at the front of the stage with her baton in hand, Christina Morris ’21 conducts a talented group of music students, directing a confluence of sounds rising from the violins, violas and cellos assembled before her.

Standing at the front of the classroom with a large screen projecting his PowerPoint presentation, Noah White ’22 speaks with ease while discussing the differences between maritime and continental air masses to a group of sixth-grade science students at A.A. Kingston Middle School.

Standing in front of a classroom full of elementary school students in New York City, Isata Tarawally ’19, a community health major at SUNY Potsdam, discusses what to do when facing a natural disaster. A hand goes up in the back of the class and a young boy asks her what to do if a hurricane strikes. Some of the children think they should seek shelter in a basement, but she quickly corrects them, telling them to avoid lower levels because of flooding and to be aware of nearby facilities, such as hospitals.

Standing in front of a rambunctious group of high school students, Erica Ylitalo ’19, a music education major at SUNY Potsdam, cranks up the volume on the metronome to help synchronize the band at John C. Birdlebough High School. She waves her baton in the air, conducting her music students as they perform “Foundry,” a high energy composition being rehearsed for an upcoming concert at the school—her bubbly, charismatic personality matching the piece that she conducts.

Standing on a ladder with a can of spray paint in hand, SUNY Potsdam Professor Amy Swartele uses the side of a building as her canvas. She wears a mask, not because of COVID-19, but rather to protect herself from the paint fumes wafting off the wall as she creates a colorful menagerie of unusual, blob-shaped creatures with human eyes—reminiscent of a scene from "Monsters Inc."

Standing outside SUNY Potsdam’s WISER Greenhouse, Grace Romer ’24 uses an aspirator to inhale a beetle into a small glass vile. The tiny beetle, about half the size of a fingernail, is one of thousands of little warriors leading the fight against the purple loosestrife, an invasive species in Northern New York’s wetlands.