The Fall Day of Service is one of the largest volunteer events run by the Center for Civic Engagement and is often a massive undertaking for the organization to prepare for – mostly due to the number of sites in need of volunteers, as well as the sheer number of volunteers needed to accommodate these sites.
At 7:45 AM, the roughly 61 registered volunteers will convene at Milano Ballroom. From there, they will be assigned to one of the nine volunteer sites that have requested volunteers from Norwich.
From 9:30 AM to 2:30 PM, these volunteers are dispersed across Central Vermont to aid the community. After a long day of supporting the state, the volunteers are brought back to the Milano ballroom for refreshments as well as to conduct an After Action Report on all of the volunteer events that have occurred that day.
Twice a year, the CCE will run a Day of Service, one in the fall and a second one in January, the week of Martin Luther King Day. Likewise, the Fall Day of Service is much larger than the Martin Luther King Day of Service, both in the number of sites and in volunteers.
The selected sites range from the Salvation Army of Barre to the Turtle Island Daycare in Montpelier. Likewise, volunteers will be present at Good Beginnings of Central VT and the CERV Clothing Shelf right here in Northfield.
This event is always one of great anticipation for the CCE, especially when it comes to scheduling volunteer sites. “Some of the sites have just requested volunteers the week before while others had scheduled three months ago,” said William Ericksmoen, a Civic Scholar and member of the Corps of Cadets.
While the Day of Service is a large event, this year’s is of great importance as its focus is relief from the floods that rocked Central Vermont this past July. In particular, the cities of Montpelier and Barre bore the brunt of the flooding; as such, the majority of the sites this year are located in these two cities.
The flooding marks one of the worst in Vermont, and while Northfield overall was spared much of the damage that neighboring cities experienced, it’s important for us at Norwich to give back to this community.
For many Norwich students, this will be one of the few times they have been able to get off campus since they arrived this school year. Likewise, the event gives these students a chance to interact with local community members and learn about the state that they will be in for the better part of four years.
This is evident in that since its inception, the largest contributor to volunteers for the Day of Service is the current Rook class. Rooks greatly benefit from this experience and hopefully are encouraged by it to continue volunteering for other CCE events.
The CCE currently needs additional volunteers to contribute to the scheduled sites effectively. At this time, 41 slots remain for volunteers to sign up to attend the Day of Service and give back to the community. It is a great opportunity for the student body to get active and collaborate.
