Hamilton's Action Volunteer Outreach Coalition (HAVOC) hosted the 10th annual Martin Luther King Service Day on Saturday, Jan. 26. Students as well as other members of the Hamilton community volunteered at several non-profit agencies throughout and around the Utica area. Those who did not volunteer in Utica hosted children from the Neighborhood Center on the Hamilton campus.
The day began with over 150 student and faculty ready to work at their respective volunteer locations. The volunteer sites included the Loretto Center, a senior health care community, the American Red Cross, the Utica Children's Museum, Root Farm, JCTOD church and Emmaus House, an emergency shelter. At each location, volunteers provided service that was specific to that individual organization's need.
Volunteers at certain sites, such as the Children's Museum and American Red Cross, helped clean and organize the buildings by taking down Christmas decorations, washing windows and cleaning bathrooms. Some agencies had the volunteers decorate and help with paperwork. Those who volunteered at Root Farm in Verona worked with the "Helping Horses Help Kids" program, which creates opportunity for special needs children to receive physical therapy using the movement of horses as a treatment tool. Volunteers who hosted the children from Neighborhood Center made crafts, baked and went sledding with the children on campus.
The Service Day illustrated the motivation of the Hamilton Community to reach out to communities whose living circumstances differ greatly from our own. The motto of day was reflected on the HAVOC tee-shirts worn by all the volunteers; "We must work increasingly to uplift this nation that we love to a higher destiny, to a higher plateau of compassion to a more noble expression of humanness."
-- by Danielle Raulli '10
The day began with over 150 student and faculty ready to work at their respective volunteer locations. The volunteer sites included the Loretto Center, a senior health care community, the American Red Cross, the Utica Children's Museum, Root Farm, JCTOD church and Emmaus House, an emergency shelter. At each location, volunteers provided service that was specific to that individual organization's need.
Volunteers at certain sites, such as the Children's Museum and American Red Cross, helped clean and organize the buildings by taking down Christmas decorations, washing windows and cleaning bathrooms. Some agencies had the volunteers decorate and help with paperwork. Those who volunteered at Root Farm in Verona worked with the "Helping Horses Help Kids" program, which creates opportunity for special needs children to receive physical therapy using the movement of horses as a treatment tool. Volunteers who hosted the children from Neighborhood Center made crafts, baked and went sledding with the children on campus.
The Service Day illustrated the motivation of the Hamilton Community to reach out to communities whose living circumstances differ greatly from our own. The motto of day was reflected on the HAVOC tee-shirts worn by all the volunteers; "We must work increasingly to uplift this nation that we love to a higher destiny, to a higher plateau of compassion to a more noble expression of humanness."
-- by Danielle Raulli '10
