Spring Break is finally here, for some of people at least. Begrudgingly the rest of us will have class today and possibly even after tomorrow’s Charter Day celebrations.
Nevertheless, the moment we’ve been waiting for since Snowmagedon will take us to places such as Miami, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico or simply back home to work see the family and make a quick buck. Yet for a carefully selected 300 Howard University students, this is an opportunity to give back to their communities.
This year for Alternative Spring Break (ASB), 2010 students will visit cities such as Atlanta, Detroit, Chicago, and New Orleans, while others will stay in D.C. to do their part locally.
The students will join about 50 students from the Howard University Law School on buses leaving from Cramton Auditorium on Saturday. The total trip will be a complete week, as students will return the following Saturday, March 20th between Noon and 2pm.
For the first time, Atlanta has joined the list of cities on the Alternative Spring Break project. Erica Jai Lindsay, Alternative Spring Break 2010 Student Coordinator, told The Hilltop that Atlanta was chosen out of New York and Philadelphia. Atlanta’s heavy representation on campus in the student population combined with logistical and financial benefits ultimately made it the perfect choice. In addition, the mayoral race in Atlanta last year played a big part.
“We just got Kasim Reed at the time that he was running for Mayor and we knew he was a Howard grad and on the board here at Howard”, Lindsay said. “ We knew we’d have the support and he’s starting an initiative for youth development, so it’s a good time to have a Howard presence down there.”
In Atlanta, the ASB crew will work primarily with youth development in local schools to help students with testing. Later, the students will work with Upward Bound, where they will mentor college-bound students to explain college life and offer various student mentorship opportunities. In addition the team will work with Hands On Atlanta, where they will do community service events throughout the week.
Other students will be traveling south, but this time back to New Orleans. Lindsay explains that this year things will be a bit different.
“The focus is the same in terms of environmental protection, but the need has slight shifted,” she said. “When we first went down the need was to fix after Hurricane Katrina, but now the need isn’t as strong, so they’re breaching out to other organizations.”
Students from the Law School will help New Orleans residents with their legal maters via partnerships with many local law organizations and law firms. Undergraduate students will help rebuild churches, homes and playgrounds.
In the Midwest, trips to Chicago and Detroit remain and will resume the work they did where they left off last year. In Detroit the focus will be literacy. Howard students will visit Highland Park High School to mentor and tutor as in Atlanta. They will also work with the Salvation Army and Plymouth Church for different community service opportunities.
In Chicago, the focus is once again gun violence. Return visits to South Shore High School and Inglewood High School are on the itinerary to mentor and console victims of gun violence. Many students have family or know of someone who has been slain by such violence. They will also work with religious figures in the city, such as Father Pfleger.
“He’s really big on gun violence and they’ll be going to Springfield to lobby on different bills,” she said. Their work will combine activism with lobbying for stricter gun control legislation.
Austin Edwards, sophomore political science major will be among the students traveling to Chicago. Edwards said, “Chicago is definitely politics oriented and on top of doing the anti-gun violence when we see the kids, I know we’re going to be canvassing and appeals to me as a political science major.” Edwards choose Chicago as a chance to see a major city he hasn’t before as well involve himself in a “worthy cause.”
Some Alternative Spring Break students will actually work in Washington, D.C. this year.
The focus is on younger, elementary school students. Peer-to-peer mentorship is a continuing theme here in the District. Homelessness will also be tackled. Yet, for the first time, lobbying on Capitol Hill will be tried as well.
However, Alternative Spring Break is more than simply work for a good cause. It’s actually fun. Erica Jai Lindsay explains that when she first went on her Alternative Spring Break to New Orleans in 2008, she finished work at the latest by 4pm, leaving her with plenty of time to visit family or do whatever she wanted to do. This year, in cities such as Atlanta, students will be finished by 6 p.m. and will be free to do what they want there and in the other four locations. Bowling night and other activities will be provided to for students to have fun and shuttles will provide transportation to high profile events.
“You get to explore the city a lot and you have a lot of free time,” she said.
In addition, connections with the alumni in the area have been created. Each Alternative Spring Break team has been in contact with each city’s respective Alumni Association, where students will be able to meet the alumni and connect the past with the present.
The buses for ASB 2010 leave from Cramton Auditorium this Saturday at noon, yet students who didn’t make this year’s roster or will be in the areas of the Alternative Spring Break team may still join their efforts. The Alternative Spring Break office has received a lot of emails about the issue and requests that students email their concerns to the main email accounts to account for them.
“The desire to serve is still there, but then there are still logistical matters that we can’t overlook,” said Lindsay. “Everybody that’s willing to help should be accommodated.”
Alternative Spring Break wraps up the following Saturday, March 20th as buses return to the main Howard University Campus between Noon and 2pm.
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