Aurora University students spent their Spring break serving others in Kentucky and Ohio.
Sponsored by Aurora University’s Wackerlin Center for Faith and Action, 12 students and four faculty-staff members volunteered for service trips March 7-11.
Rev. Mark Woolfington, University chaplain and Mitchell Lave, visiting assistant professor of parks and recreation, led four students who served at Athens, Ohio-based Good Works, a nonprofit that serves rural southeastern Ohio residents. More than 50% of the population is below the poverty level.
Activities included sorting donations and restocking a thrift store that benefits Rural Action, an environmental agency. Additionally, the Aurora University delegation participated in Neighbors Helping Neighbors, a Good Works program that provides low-cost home repairs to residents in need. Volunteers installed a handrail for an elderly widow and performed yard work for a Vietnam veteran with cancer.
Kidada Robinson, senior graduate advising manager and Christopher Smith, director of residence life, led eight students who volunteered in an initial visit to Cross Roads Mission in Louisville, Ky.. Cross Roads is helping rebuild damage from tornadoes that hit western Kentucky last year.
Activities included removing carpet from a live-in addictions recovery center, painting and yard cleanup, and removing construction materials from a home being built for adults with disabilities. Volunteers worked with refugee students in an after-school program, cleaned debris and underbrush for a new fence line and cleaned corrals and groomed horses at Stormhaven Youth Ranch, a facility that heals hurting children with rescued horses.
On a free day, Aurora University volunteers visited the Muhammad Ali Center and Louisville Slugger Museum, walked the pedestrian bridge crossing from Kentucky into Indiana and visited a botanical garden/cemetery.
—Al Benson