Spring break is traditionally a time for college students to escape their busy schedules and unwind. Oftentimes students go home, go to the beach, or go to other popular destinations. Habitat for Humanity offers a unique option for student groups from college and universities to participate in service, called an alternative spring break (ASB) trip. These student group and campus chapters are presented with the opportunity to meaningfully serve with a local Habitat affiliate.
Habitat MontDelco was excited to have 17 students and four advisors from Holy Family University, a private university in Philadelphia, join us for their ASB trip from March 1-4. In pre-pandemic times, Holy Family University was able to assemble a group of 30 to 40 student volunteers to travel for their alternative spring break trip. The last two years, with COVID-19 raging across the world, it has been challenging at many colleges to keep student engagement and recruitment in on and off campus activities. Holy Family University Habitat was able to bring together an excellent group of student volunteers to Habitat MontDelco, and as their host, we welcomed the opportunity to assist them in rebuilding and strengthening their group through meaningful work and great memories.
Holy Family students and advisors started the week by helping to build Adirondack chairs and bird houses that will go towards fundraising for our Faith Build. Throughout the rest of the week, they helped with a number of projects in our West Norriton ReStore. Some of the projects included:
-Helped remove shelving in the front room so slat wall could be put up to better display the artwork
-Helped put up new shelving in the lighting section
-Helped process the daily donations with the help of our regular volunteer, Bren Weir
-Helped paint the doors that lead into the houseware section
-Helped organize a huge donation of carpenter gloves and other carpenter supplies
-Helped relocate shelving to better display the bed-frame sets
-Helped with putting together a silent auction
-And a number of smaller but very important projects that helped improve the store.
One of the Habitat campus chapter advisors, Michael McNulty-Bobhlz, mentioned the importance of these spring break trips to the students in the group. “Holy Family is primarily a commuter school” so these Habitat (ASB) trips allowed for students to come together “and travel, for many of them, for the first time and be away from family.” This trip with Habitat MontDelco was a chance to reboot their campus club chapter. One of the seniors, a returning Habitat student said, “I attended Holy Family University because they had a Habitat for Humanity chapter and I’m glad to be back with Habitat helping my community in any way I can.” Additionally, another student, a first-year student, said,
“I made so many new friends this week, learned more about my local community and I’m looking forward to continuing to volunteer with Habitat.”
The most important team members at any Habitat are the volunteers, and it is great to see the passion and interest for service grow in new volunteers and strengthen in regular volunteers.
In addition to our student volunteers, every day, we welcomed a church group from our committed Faith Build churches to sponsor a lunch. We wanted to give a shout-out to their warm smiles and delicious food they provided for the Holy Family University students.
Each day ended with a recap and a short activity led by our ReStore Manage, Jeff Long, who dubbed them “ReStore Games,” such as The Price is Right and ReStore Scavenger Hunt.
Habitat MontDelco is blessed to have met and worked alongside these amazing college volunteers. The work completed helped the ReStore increase its sales. Volunteer hours lower our costs, combined with the revenue from the ReStore ensures more dollars go toward Habitat MontDelco’s affordable home-ownership mission. Our volunteers contribute so much to what we do, and we are so thankful for every hand that has helped make our mission possible.
Komentarze