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TAKING A BREAK TO HELP OTHERS
By Claire Semder
POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y., Oct. 11 --- Spring break took on a new meaning for a group of Marist students who recently journeyed to Mexico, not to lounge on the beaches of Cancun, but to aid the people in the small fishing village of Progreso.
Marist students had this opportunity because of the Global Outreach program, led by Jamie Williams, Campus Ministry’s head of community service.
Prior to Williams’ arrival in 2004, programs similar to Global Outreach were set up through the student-organized initiative Marist Praxis Project to go to Miravalles, Mexico, but when that site became unavailable, there was a hiatus in the trips.
According to Williams, when she reinstated the program in 2006, she did not want students to have the typical spring break experience, but instead, to become part of something bigger than themselves and to “participate in service on a global level.”
“It is a testament to the Marist community that so many volunteer to go,” she said. “I think the students definitely walked away with a sense of empowerment.”
Richard Mejia, a sophomore information technology and systems major, who traveled with the group in spring 2007, said that it was rare for a freshman to have the opportunity to spend spring break in Mexico.
“I can’t really compare it to a regular vacation,” he said. “It was anything but normal. For the most part, we were working in the community with their needs. We were more concerned about helping them then getting a good tan or taking a swim in the pool.”
Senior Danielle LaMountain, an art major, also traveled to Progreso with the Global Outreach program the spring prior to Mejia.
“We weren’t laying out on the beach everyday,” she said. “We would spend our days interacting with the local community. Essentially, our trip was spiritually guided, whereas a normal spring break vacation is meant to be pure relaxation.”
Campus Ministry’s Williams said there is a difference between a relaxing spring break trip and the outreach program. “It’s not an easy experience. There are a lot of challenges on many levels, and I think the students found they had the capacity to do things that they never thought they could do before, whether it be the work that we did, living in close quarters, or building friendships with people they never would have imagined meeting before.”
Eric Zedalis, a senior communications major who traveled with the same group as LaMountain in spring 2006, said he made the right choice in taking the “atypical vacation to Mexico.”
“Personally, what I got out of the Global Outreach program were things I would not have gotten out of a normal spring break trip,” Zedalis said. “The group I went with really became my family. We worked together, ate together, goofed around together, and prayed together.”
Additionally, LaMountain said that compared to spending this upcoming spring break on a Carnival cruise to the Caribbean with her friends, her time spent in Mexico was memorable and economical, “which is important to a college student.”
“[The students] didn’t end up spending any money on Mexico because of generous donations and fundraising, but my spring break trip this year costs about a thousand dollars,” she said. “Both instances are going to create lifetime memories, but the Global Outreach program is something that affected other people’s futures, and so it meant more to me.”
Nevertheless, it was not all work for Zedalis and company.
“The beaches were beautiful, there were palm trees everywhere and, although the area we worked in was impoverished, the houses along the street we lived on were built like palaces almost,” he said. “We still got to experience paradise, but we also helped people.”
Every student was able to bring something different to Progreso. Mejia was surprised to use what he learned from his IT classes to help the children in the village.
“We taught kids how to use the keyboard to spell out their names and favorite foods, as well as PowerPoint, Word, and Paint,” he said. “The kids did an awesome job!”
Similarly, Zedalis’ fondest moment of his trip was teaching English to Emilio, an 80-year-old man.
“Emilio decided, as old as he was, it was not too late to take on a new venture like learning English,” he said. “We were trying to hold a conversation at the end of class, and he mentioned to me that he was married. So I asked him how long he had been married, but he thought I asked him how many wives he had. He laughed and said, ‘No, no, no, just one wife, just one wife.’”
Williams only brought eight students on each trip “as we do not want to overwhelm our small community,” but hopes that in the future she will find more sites and be able to bring more students.
It is because of these experiences that the students who have gone on the Global Outreach programs in the past encourage others to forgo the usual spring break of swimming, tanning and drinking to take the time to help others.
“I would tell others to do it because it’s a once in a lifetime experience,” Mejia said. “You can take a spring break with your friends and family whenever you want, but how often do you get to travel to the Yucatan and help improve a community?”