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Oneonta Helpers - Behind the Mask(s)

Faculty, staff, students and alumni work from home to produce masks, PPE and more

By SUNY Oneonta

April 30^th, 2020

Our world has been turned upside down by COVID-19.

To slow the spread of the pandemic, SUNY Oneonta and many other colleges were forced to move all instruction online and watch, heartbroken, as students packed their belongings and moved off campus for the rest of the semester. We canceled long-awaited events and postponed commencement. We shuttered buildings and sent employees home.

Eager to help in some way, SUNY Oneonta faculty, staff, students and alumni jumped into action, working from their homes to produce face masks and other personal protective equipment for essential staff on campus and beyond...

Staying Stylishly Safe

Olivia Riley, a junior Fashion Merchandising student from Elmira, NY, was supposed to be designing bridal wear for the Student Fashion Society’s spring fashion show. Instead, she used the fabric to design and make a collection of about 30 face masks for her family and friends who are essential workers. She says she will participate in next year’s spring fashion show and may incorporate some of her "bridal masks," which range in design and fabric, from white lace to velvet to leopard-print.

The Show Must Go On

A month ago, members of SUNY Oneonta's Theatre Department were building scenery from cotton fabric for their production of Once Upon a Mattress. When the production was canceled, they began using the fabric to make masks for local needs and health care workers on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic in NYC.

Organized by Assistant Technical Director Matthew Grenier and Technical Director Scott Segar, the department also began 3D printing face shield parts and manufacturing Tyvek gowns and scrub caps. They have shipped 200 face shield kits, as well as 29 gowns and 70 scrub caps, to health care providers on the front lines.

Soon, the Theatre contingency teamed up with David Kenny, instructional support technician with the Art Department, and Allen Anderson, science technician with the Department of Physics and Astronomy, who were also making face shield parts. With support from the A.J. Read Science Discovery Center, they have formed the group, “SUNY Oneonta Volunteers Creating PPE.” Collectively, they've sent more than 500 3D printed parts to support face shield projects at SUNY New Paltz, SUNY Albany and in NYC.

Keeping Busy in Kansas City

April Brewer, Class of 2013, is the assistant production manager at the Kansas City Repertory Theatre, one of the largest theaters in the Midwest. When COVID-19 forced all productions to be canceled there, Brewer and the costume shop went to work making masks. They have donated more than 250 masks to area nursing homes, EMTs and other friends on the front lines.

Taking a Spirited Spin

Chris Schuler, head coach of the men's and women's swimming and diving teams, knew she wanted to put an Oneonta spin on her homemade masks. Using iron-on decals, she and her 13-year-old daughter, Maggie, began affixing Oneonta “Fast O” logos and Red Dragon mascots to the masks. She has now made close to 50 masks for friends, family, SUNY Oneonta employees and community members.

A Family Affair

SUNY Oneonta alumna and Associate Director of Digital Strategy Jennifer Smith has always been crafty, sewing Halloween costumes for her 8-year-old daughter, Kendra, and making themed birthday cakes. When she heard there was a need for masks locally, she teamed up remotely with her sister-in-law, Jen, to churn out a number of them for family, friends and workers on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic. Jennifer’s daughter and husband, Don, even got in on the operation, helping in any way they could. She has discovered several ways to increase the comfort of her masks, including using strips of T-shirt fabric instead of elastic for the ear pieces and making embroidered “ear savers” using vinyl.

Cooperstown Connection

When Cooperstown Graduate Program students Phoebe Cos, Lorene Sugars and Emma Bresnan began making masks for friends, family and community members, they soon realized the importance of bias tape makers, small contraptions that allow for faster production of the band that ties masks behind the head. The students asked CGP Associate Professor of Science Erik Stengler to use the 3D printer to make a few for them. Stengler’s bias tape makers became popular around Cooperstown and he is now printing them and giving them away from his porch.

Working the Night Shift

In about a month, SUNY Oneonta alumna and employee Aimee Swan, assistant director for Application Services at the college's SICAS Center, has helped sew more than 500 face masks for friends, family members, nursing homes and essential workers. She works remotely with her neighbor, Margot Reynolds, who is also a SUNY Oneonta employee, and their friend, Jaclyn, to make the masks. With a 2-year-old and 6-year-old at home, Aimee isn’t able to begin working on masks until about 9 p.m. Most nights, she sews until 2 a.m.

Spartan Made

By day, Doug Reilly serves as director of SUNY Oneonta's A.J. Read Science Discovery Center. By night, he runs a small soft goods business called Spartan Made out of his home, a 1947 solar-powered travel trailer. Reilly designs and sews pencil cases, pouches, tote bags and more on his 1921 Singer sewing machine and sells them in his online Etsy shop.

Since the onslaught of COVID-19, Reilly’s two occupations have intersected. During the third week of March, he decided it would be helpful to learn how to sew protective face masks, and he began working with campus Health & Safety Officer Peter Booth to create an effective mask design that could be used to reinforce official campus PPE supplies, if needed. Reilly has offered three DIY mask-making online workshops through the Science Discovery Center and coordinates the Center’s role in the SUNY Oneonta Volunteers Creating PPE group.

Anticipating that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would soon advise the general public to begin wearing masks, Reilly added organic cotton masks to the list of items he makes and sells through Spartan Made. With the help of two local seamstresses, he has made and sold nearly 280 masks and shipped them as far away as Alaska and Japan.