Just $1 provides 15 pounds
of food to those in need.
Students line up to answer call, volunteer time on MLK day
Jan 17, 2012
Taylor Muller of Kirksville Daily Express
After devoting six hours to 19 community service organizations, more than 150 Truman State students, faculty and staff were reminded to carry their feelings of good-will and caring beyond the holiday of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
For its fourth year, about 170 university members met in the morning and split into groups to serve at 19 various community service organizations throughout the community as part of the MLK Collegiate Challenge, providing manual labor, fundraising and enthusiasm for the day.
“The students really take it to heart,” said Bertha Thomas, event organizer and Multicultural Affairs director. “They go to the site and talk to people that are running the programs or receiving services and they internalize how important and thankful the groups are and they want to go out and help year after year.”
The volunteers gathered at Truman State following their day of work and shared their experiences helping others, relating stories from organizing a play showing fairness and cooperation at a local daycare center, to helping shelve books and rearrange furniture at the Adair County Public Library.
Each of the volunteers could have taken the day off, as most government employees and students did for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, but Truman State strives each year to make it a day “on” not a day “off.”
For some of the volunteers, the day provided a chance to expand their efforts and for others it’s a yearly reminder of their connection to the community.
“It was my first time volunteering outside of a class,” Erin Foster said. “I really wanted to do something on my own and it’s an opportunity to help the community.”
Foster was part of the group that helped the La Plata
Christian Ministries Food Bank. Upon receiving their assignment the group of about 10 students was asked to raise 500 pounds of food, a daunting task when they first started, the group said.
“When we first started out, we didn’t know if we’d make it,” said team leader Babajide Adio. “But people were really willing to give that much.”
Between food and cash donations, the group raised 594 pounds of food before the day was over, far exceeding their own expectations but also showing them the community’s ability to answer the call to service and beyond.
“People were very willing to give that much,” Adio said, sharing stories of collecting donations outside of a local grocery store. “For some of the donations, we’d tell people it was for Martin Luther King Day, but a lot would just come up and ask us what it was for and come back out with so much more than a can or two of food.”
Team leader Brendan O’Brien said his group’s efforts with the Food Bank for Central and Northeast Missouri felt good because at the end of the day, they could see each of the buddy packs they assembled and know each one would go to a child in need.
“You can picture how happy the kids are when they’re being given this simple opportunity of food and the opportunity to do better at school,” O’Brien said. “It was a good day.”
O’Brien and his team assembled about 200 buddy packs, each of which will be discretely provide food and nutrition for children in need during weekends away from school.
And while the service challenge lasted for only a day, each of the volunteers were urged to carry their stories and memories of helping in the name of Martin Luther King Jr., throughout the year.
“Think about what you did and what it meant,” said John Gardner, the emcee for the closing event and Res-Life director. “Don’t leave it here. Carry it forward. It’s not just about today. It’s about making a better world. It’s been a great day and let’s make it a great year.”
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