What Happens Here Matters

Students Volunteer With St. Bernard Project

Students Volunteer With St. Bernard Project

Eight volunteers from Manhattanville’s Duchesne Center recently took a trip to New Orleans for a week to help rebuild homes with the St. Bernard Project. The St. Bernard Project is a nonprofit organization which helps families rebuild homes lost in Hurricane Katrina.  The volunteers stayed at Camp Hope, a hotel sponsored by Habitat for Humanity and created specifically for volunteers.  Volunteers are able to stay at Camp Hope for an extremely discounted rate which includes meals.

Manhattanville Volunteers Craig Donnelly, Community Service Coordinator for the Duchesne Center, was the trip leader.  “This was the fourth time that Manhattanville students have traveled with the Duchesne Center to volunteer in New Orleans,” he said. “We worked with Habitat for Humanity on our first trip in the summer of 2006, and we worked with the St. Bernard Project for the first time in the summer of 2007, and our third trip was earlier this year.  We stayed at Camp Hope on our last two trips instead of getting a hotel because I wanted to teach the students that you don’t have to spend a lot of money in order to do volunteer work that requires travel.  Staying at Camp Hope also allowed us to meet a lot of other volunteers and to establish a greater bond with the population that we were working with.”

The Manhattanville volunteers worked on two different houses during the course of the week, helping to paint rooms, and put in new floors, walls and windows.  Craig said that the students particularly enjoy working with the St. Bernard Project because St. Bernard volunteers generally work on homes with the family members who own them.  “To see firsthand the positive affect of your work makes everyone want to come back next year,” he said.

However the week in New Orleans wasn’t all work. In between projects the volunteers were able to soak up some local culture by touring the revived music scene to watch jazz performances.

Student Volunteers
David Bedard
Kimberly Nilsson
Christa Nessel
Richard Panzenbeck
Danielle Scovazzo
Colin McCarthy
Joy Anena Odongpiny