News Students Take Part in Annual Day of Service
September 08, 2009
First-year students took part in their inaugural Emmanuel volunteer experience during the College's 14th Annual Day of Service on September 1st. Nearly 340 students participated in the tradition, volunteering their time to Greater Boston area non-profit organizations throughout the day for a total of 1,328 hours of service.
Students spent time among nine different service sites, which included the Franklin Park Zoo, the Greater Boston Food Bank, Community Servings, Cradles to Crayons, Muddy River Clean-Up, Marian Manor, St. Ambrose Family Shelter, St. Mary of the Angels Parish in Roxbury and Mission Grammar School.
The Annual Day of Service introduced new students to some of the volunteer opportunities available to them at Emmanuel and throughout Boston. The day also allowed for new students to get to know one another and bond with their new classmates through serving the community.
"I had a great time volunteering at St. Mary of the Angels. It was an experience that I had not had before," said Elizabeth Humphries '10, who served as a student leader. "It was awesome having the chance to meet the new students and get to know them."
Each service site offered opportunities for new students to volunteer for a good cause, however, the 96 students who chose to volunteer their time at the Franklin Park Zoo got much more. While cleaning up the zoo grounds, the students stumbled upon the movie set of an upcoming film, The Zookeeper, and were asked to act as extras in the scene being shot. The group was excited to represent Emmanuel in the film and discussed seeing the movie together when it comes to theaters.
"Since we were all wearing our electric blue Emmanuel "Lucky 13" service shirts, we were the perfect rendition of a tour group for the movie," said Sheila Connolly '13. "As soon as we were on the way back to campus, everyone on the bus had their phone out in order to mass text-message the great news to our soon-to-be-jealous friends!"
In addition to the Day of Service, the College also held the annual Volunteer Fair on September 9th. The fair featured various organizations throughout the Greater Boston area. Students were able to make connections with representatives from each organization and chose which volunteer opportunities would be the best fit for them.
