DSU Day of Service planned for April 25
April 12, 2018
The concept of service is nothing new to Dakota State University. Students, faculty, and staff are involved with a variety of service projects year-round.
The school’s signature service event is coming up on April 25, the third annual Day of Service. For the 2017 Day of Service, 433 volunteers put in 1,504 hours of work, plus 200 planning hours.
Examples of projects from 2017 include College of Education majors who volunteered at area schools; others sorted items at the Encore Store and St. John’s Clothing Closet. Some took on spring cleaning jobs at Graceland Cemetery, highway road ditches, area parks, and organizations such as Bethel Lutheran Homes, Valiant Living and Camp Lakodia. Still other volunteers tied fleece blankets at Madison Regional Health System, painted at the Greater Madison Area Chamber of Commerce, or removed a mural at the Madison Public Library.
This year the university is again hosting a food drive for the Day of Service. Nonperishable food items and personal hygiene items will be collected for the Madison Food Pantry from April 13–24. Drop-off locations include Sunshine, Shopko and Lewis. The university’s food service provider, Sodexo, will match all food collected pound for pound. Final pick up at these locations will be on April 25.
Because the university doesn’t reserve their philanthropy for this single day, community service project examples can be found on the calendar throughout the school year. An example is the recent Packs for Kids service project completed by students in Campus Crusade for Christ, or CRU. CRU is a nonprofit interdenominational organization for college and university students. About 30 students helped pack 100 backpacks with school supplies and hygiene items for Cambodian children on March 27.
CRU member Lindsey Bishop, an elementary education major from Pierre, S.D., heard about the Packs for Kids projects at a CRU conference in Minnesota. They were hosting a large-scale project there, she said, and asked for volunteers to hold similar events on their campuses. “This appealed to me because I had been to Malaysia on a mission trip and worked with refugees from Cambodia,” Bishop said. “You see a huge need. There is so much poverty there.”
Bailey Moody, an elementary education/special education major from Letcher, S.D. volunteered to help. The two students raised enough money from students, local churches and businesses to pack 50 boxes; World Vision, Packs for Kids’ sponsoring agency, had funds for another 50, so students shipped 100 boxes from DSU.
Moody told the volunteers that Packs for Kids was “a small event that can make a big impact.” She and Bishop both said they would likely help with the Day of Service as well, to continue making an impact.
On April 25, afternoon classes will be cancelled, and activities will begin with lunch at noon, after which the volunteers will move out into the community to help individuals, businesses and organizations.
Students, faculty and staff are asked to sign-up for Day of Service at https://dsu.wufoo.com/forms/q1e5yyv60xo5tgi/.
For more information, contact Mandy Parpart, director of Student Activities, at 605-256-5244 or at amanda.parpart@dsu.edu.
Community members who have a project to suggest for this year or for future years may also contact Parpart.