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February 7, 2003
Mount
Holyoke Group Helps Build Home in Florida for Needy Family
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Photo:
Charity Bishop '04
Service
and Leadership Odyssey students pose with others working
on a Habitat for Humanity project in Florida. |
For one week this
January, a diverse group of ten Mount Holyoke College students
headed to south Florida—not to catch rays—but to help
a low-income family achieve its dream of owning a home. The students,
accompanied by Rochelle Calhoun, acting dean of the College, and
Anita Magovern, the College's Catholic chaplain, arrived
in Florida January 19 to begin a week as members of a Habitat
for Humanity crew constructing a home in Greenacres, a community
near West Palm Beach. The project was part of this year's
Service and Leadership Odyssey (SLO), a joint effort of the dean
of students and the Office of Religious and Spiritual Life. In
addition to providing a way to be of service to the community,
SLO "is about bringing together a diverse group of women
to work toward a common goal," says Calhoun. "We talk
a lot about service to others and about diversity issues. This
is a chance for students to put the talk into action and become
a leader in a diverse group by serving." A veteran of all
four SLO trips, Calhoun felt that the most meaningful part of
the trip for her was "the opportunity to see the hard work
and dedication of our Mount Holyoke students. Each time I take
the SLO trip, I am again impressed with the fact that our students
find ways to be generous of time and spirit."
The students broke ground for the new home, digging the footings
and preparing the forms for the concrete to be poured, says Carolyn
Vickey, volunteer coordinator for Habitat for Humanity of Palm
Beach County. When finished, perhaps as early as April, the three-bedroom,
1,160-square-foot house at 511 Jennings Street will become a home
to Johnson and Nubia Davila and their three-year-old daughter.
The MHC students were chosen from among a field of forty applicants
to create a community that was ethnically, racially, and religiously
diverse. While in Florida, the students lived in a student village
owned by several local colleges, putting into practice the training
they received in living in and building a diverse community. Students
took turns preparing meals, for example, and choosing cultural
activities for the evening. Each day, the students were asked
to reflect on their experiences of the day.
Looking back on the entire experience upon her return, participant
Antoinette Benneh '06 says, "The trip was awesome,
everything I expected and more. I went on this trip because as
an international student [from Ghana], I wanted to try something
new and also get a chance to do some community service. The high
points were getting to know so many people with different backgrounds
and making strong connections with them. The most unforgettable
moment was when we donated our hours [the MHC group offered its
144 collective hours of labor to a man who worked alongside them
all week, putting in his 500 hours of "sweat equity"
to qualify for a new home] to one of the applicants working for
his house. He was so happy. At that moment, the full impact of
what we were doing for these people really hit me. I am so proud
I was a part of it."
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Photo:
Charity Bishop '04
Rochelle
Calhoun, acting dean of the College, found that this year's
Service and Leadership Odyssey measured up to the past three. |
Magovern also found
the reaction of the man to whom the hours had been donated to
be particularly moving. "We called him over that last morning,
and offered him our hours," she said. "He literally
fell to his knees to thank God and us for our gift. We also gave
him a photo album, where he could put pictures of his house as
it is being built. We promised to send him a picture we took of
him and us, as his first photo in the album. I asked him later
how much our gift added to his required hours, and he said that
it brought him over the top. What a thrill I felt to know that
we had contributed to his having a new home, as well as reducing
some of this very difficult work for him. After he put in his
morning hours every day, he went off to his regular eight-hour
job, which began at noon."
In previous years, SLO students helped inner-city elementary school
students create murals; worked in soup kitchens in Washington,
D.C.; and helped rebuild an Alabama church that had been destroyed
by arson. Habitat for Humanity International is a nonprofit, nondenominational
Christian housing organization that builds simple, decent, affordable
houses in partnership with those in need of adequate shelter.
Since 1976, Habitat has built more than 125,000 houses in more
than eighty countries, including some 45,000 houses across the
United States.
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