How would VCU students react if someone offered to take them on the spring break of a lifetime? And when they realized the week would be alcohol and drug free, how quickly would VCU’s thrill seekers become a bit skeptical?
For three years, more than 50 of VCU’s students have been jumping at this chance by signing up for Alternative Spring Break. Each year, the program sends 10 to 15 students to change lives through volunteer work at five different sites across the country.
Benita Panigrahi, president of ASB at VCU, said she founded the organization after being profoundly affected by her own community service journey.
“Honestly, this is the best thing I’ve done in my entire life,” Panigrahi said, “and nobody believed me so I thought I should start this.”
Panigrahi’s enthusiasm has rubbed off on her peers, many of whom are trying to rush their applications for 2006 spring break before the Nov. 11 deadline. The $115 cost, Panigrahi said, ends up being well worth it since students will never forget their experiences.
“As participants, they really get the experience of being immersed in the community,” she said. “Not only do they get the experience of helping someone out, but they feel what it’s like to be in someone else’s shoes.”
This year, students will again head out to address a variety of needs and help a wide range of people. In Avon Park, Fla., students will work with Habitat for Humanity to build homes, while in New York City, another group will align with “Women in Need” to get underprivileged and homeless women back on their feet. Aid in New York City will include childcare services and domestic violence counseling, as well as job preparation and help battling drug and alcohol addiction.
“It’s not just a service experience, it’s an educational experience as well. … If we can link it with the women’s studies department here, it just helps everything come full circle,” Panigrahi said.
Another trip, which brings volunteers to the Fowler Center in Mayville, Mich., has become a VCU tradition. Each year, ASB volunteers have helped adults and children at the center who have developmental and physical disabilities. A similar trip will also send students to Camp Oakhurst in Oakhurst, N.J., where they will boost the spirits of children and adults with chronic diseases such as cerebral palsy and muscular dystrophy.
The fifth site will get the most focus, as ASB plans to send 50 to 60 students and faculty to the Gulf Coast to help hurricane victims. The location, either New Orleans or Pasculusa, Miss., remains undefined, as does the method of service. What is certain, said Beth Ward, ASB’s adviser, is the volunteers’ commitment to doing all they can to help.
“They could be working in a food line supporting the personnel down there or it could be hands-on building projects or it could be a combination,” Ward said. “They’ll just go down prepared to do whatever.
“That flexibility is a part of it. You just have to be prepared for anything that comes along.”
Ward, who came on board as the group’s adviser this year, said she was quickly impressed by the praise from past participants.
“All of the students share very similar comments,” she said. “They all comment on how close they’ve become to the other participants. They’ve made lifelong friendships.”
Panigrahi agreed that volunteers should expect to grow while providing assistance to others.
“The whole point of ASB is for students to get this eye-opening experience where we’re giving to the community and the community is giving back to us,” Panigrahi said.
Aside from personal growth, volunteers will learn some skills along the way. Volunteers who are heading to homebuilding sites, Ward said, will learn enough beforehand so they are comfortable and confident. One of the 2005 volunteers realized he had been hammering nails incorrectly his whole life. Meanwhile, Panigrahi learned how to insulate a house while serving as a site leader last spring break.
In what Panigrahi called “the marriage of leadership and service,” site leaders will manage the volunteer work and make sure each trip reaches its potential. These leaders undergo training every week leading up to the trips and study a 50-page manual that outlines their responsibilities.
Although students mostly remember the good times they had as part of ASB, Panigrahi said students should make sure they are committed before signing up.
“I’m not going to say it’s a fun trip the entire time,” she said. “There is adversity, but the fact that (they) get through it does a lot for them and shows them what they’re capable of.”