Reflections on Alternative Spring Break – Day 5
By Kara Collier, Purdue University
It’s hard to believe that the final day of work at United Way's Alternative Spring Break is already upon us; it’s a bittersweet feeling but we definitely went out with a bang today. Our group joined six other students at Habitat for Humanity to help them finish making a house for a family in need. It was an awesome experience to participate in another work site and getting to know some new people. The students at Habitat for Humanity have been building a house from the ground up and their progress was astonishing. The project today included putting siding on the house and painting the exterior beige. This may seem like a simple task at first, but it certainly wasn’t. I spent the entire day along with another student, Paige Roebuck, measuring siding boards, cutting them to size and taking them to a designated area of the house. To see how we transformed this house in just one day was incredible. Working with Habitat for Humanity was a completely different experience than what I had been doing previously this week, it was much more physically exhausting and required good teamwork. It was exciting to be able to participate in two completely different service projects and still feel equally rewarded at the end of the day. My favorite part of this day was knowing that the work we were doing was something that was going to be permanent. Our volunteer efforts would result in a family having a home and lifelong memories – it is truly amazing to know I was a part of this effort.
Tonight our social activity was to tour the Lynn Meadows Discovery Center, which was one of the ASB work sites this week. While we ate pizza for dinner, we also shared our experiences at our respective sites and saw first-hand the work that some of our fellow students had done at this site. After touring the center, we headed towards the media room. This was a large, open room with a giant projector and movie screen. We started the night off with a dance party and then ended with watching the movie Gravity. It was nice being able to sit back and relax for a little bit with some of my new, greatest friends. While we were all sad to be done with our service work for the week, we are excited for a day at the beach on Friday for our celebration – thank you United Way Worldwide and United Way of South Mississippi for making this a great week!