2018 Global Days of Service Scales New Heights
Principians far and wide came out in full force to make the third annual Global Days of Service campaign an unqualified success. From Atlanta to Seattle, Florida to California—and in between in St. Louis, Kansas City, and Phoenix—Principia alumni, students, and staff threw themselves into volunteer work with generosity of spirit and time.
Growing out of the National Volunteer Week first proclaimed in 1974 by President Richard Nixon, April has been observed as National Volunteer Month in the United States since 1991. In recent decades, educational institutions, corporations, and individuals have responded to the call for giving of their time and talents to help a variety of community initiatives near or far.
In 2016, Principia’s Office of Alumni & Field Relations (AFR) set in motion a Principia Global Days of Service initiative with the intent of “connecting alumni and friends around the world through service in their local communities,” explains AFR Field Relations Manager Merrilee McFarland (US’99, C’03). She and her associates have worked through the expansive network of Principia Club presidents and the Principia Alumni Association Board to get the word out—and to receive input and feedback from far-flung volunteers as well as those on both Principia campuses. Using social media and other electronic communications, the team has successfully rallied Principians to action and shared their stories, especially through Facebook.
This year’s month-long effort has already surpassed expectations, even while news of volunteer projects is still rolling in. "To date, 643 Principians have given 4,296 hours of service to 52 organizations on three continents," says Marina Whitney (US'08, C'12), AFR program coordinator.
Alumni activities during April 2018 included the following:
- Individuals volunteered at local communities, schools, and churches, with one 1962 College alum documenting 72 hours of volunteering!
- Numerous Principia-related groups took part in a variety of projects—assembling bicycles for donation to elementary school students (Salinas, California); gardening and planting vegetables at a care facility (Seattle, Washington); sorting and stocking items at a food bank (Naples, Florida); and creating decorations for a care facility during an Acorn Program event for families with young children (Atlanta, Georgia), for example.
Not to be outdone, current students and staff have also been actively engaged. Here are a few examples:
- At the Principia Business Office on the School campus, more than 620 food items were collected for donation to the St. Louis Food Bank.
- Upper School students fanned out throughout St. Louis on a “Prin Giving Day” in early April, visiting animal shelters, food banks, the Museum of Transportation, and other locations to undertake cleanup, care, and other needed activities.
- Members of the College tennis team took time out of their spring training schedule in southern California to volunteer at a local Christian Science residential community.
Enjoy a few more photos of Principians in action below. And remember, if you volunteered during April, be sure to “tell your story” to our AFR team through this link: principiaalumni.org/tellyourstory.