Making a difference

Serving in Atlanta, spring break 2011

Of Bluffton’s four Enduring Values – Discovery, Community, Respect and Service – service has always been the hardest one to capture in a story.

Not this winter however. There are a multitude of projects in the works for February, many of which are student-initiated and will make for good photographs, which combined make for good stories!

For instance (in the order in which they will happen)

• The FIA (Fashion and Interiors Association) is sponsoring “Sewing for Change” this weekend. The idea is that people can drop off their mending/alternations to FIA students during meal times today, tomorrow and Friday, Feb. 1-3. The students will fix whatever needs fixed and return the items on Monday, Feb. 6.
  
  A small fee will be charged for the work, starting at 25 cents for fixing a button, with the hope that additional donations will be made. All proceeds will go to the Gweimen Centre, a self-sufficiency centre for widows and orphans of HIV/AIDS in Nigeria, founded by the mother of Bluffton student Deborah Kadangs.
   
• The student organization SERVE (formerly known as Diakonia) is planning a three-day “bike-a-thon” to raise funds supporting its spring break service trip to Chicago through Mennonite Mission Networks DOOR program. Last year, students spent spring break in Atlanta working through the urban initiative Mission Year.
  
  Students will take turns riding an exercise bike in Marbeck Kiva from 8 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Feb. 14-16, during Spring Spiritual Life Week. Donations will be accepted during the event with a friendly competition between riders to raise the most during their time on the bike. Guest bikers will include President Harder, J. Denny Beaver, Tig Intagliata and others.
   
• On Feb. 29, baseball team members are putting their locks on the line to raise money for St. Baldrick’s Foundation, a volunteer-driven charity that funds childhood cancer research grants. You read right, at this point,  22 student athletes and coaches are accepting pledges to shave their heads on Feb. 29, a week before they head south for spring training.

Add to this list the graduate students’ Jamiii Project, the MLK Jr. Day of Service and Team Andy... What an active, involved and passionate student body we have. We can all be proud of our students who are doing their part to make this a better world.