News and Events

Alumni interested in investing in students’ service opportunities:

Service to others is at the essence of the Sewanee experience and is an integral part of the Episcopal tradition of the school. The Outreach Office of All Saints’ Chapel in conjunction with the Dean of Students and faculty members of the Service/Learning curriculum have established an international service program that over one hundred students are involved in each year.

The Outreach Office also has a comprehensive local and regional community engagement program. It is designed to foster the students’ service education and activity locally; but it is our belief that the international experience adds a deeper dimension not only to their global perspective but reversely inspires them to act locally.

Increasing the awareness of global issues often evokes a sense of calling to local community service.
Understanding that the future of the world is one in which integration, not isolation with other communities is essential.
An understanding of the entire human family from an economically disproportionate framework is vital not only to the traditional service providers (doctors, priests, teachers) but to the students of business, science, and law.

“Alumni support has made a huge impact on our programming, especially our ability to travel overseas. These programs have helped re-shape perspectives in a way that has made our students more informed and caring human beings. When these experiences are dove-tailed with exceptional classroom education, we know that the institution is offering its best.”
S. Dixon Myers

Programs for 2008/2009:

Kingston, Jamaica in January- While students started construction on the Trench Town Development Association computer building, under the guidance of Bill Mauzy C’72, Professor Greg Pond, several students and Dixon Myers filmed a documentary in TrenchTown (Kingston) that will highlight its residents and offer a unique perspective into this historic neighborhood.

Leogane, Haiti - Senior, Richie Hubbard has arranged for a Bangledeshi dentist to staff a dental clinic in Leogane, Haiti. The dentist will be installed in January of 2009 and work for two years. The dental clinic in Leogane will be happy to receive a full time dentist.

Service/Learning in Haiti, Summer 2009- Art 363 Advanced Documentary Projects in Photography and Biology 232 Human Health and the Environment will be spending two weeks in rural Haiti, working on small farms, exploring the culture and examining the country through the disciplines of Photography and Biology. With the assistance of the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti and the Organization for the Rehabilitation of the Environment ten students will be immersed in this environment for eight days. The last two days will be spent in Cange, Haiti at Zamni Lasante; a combined health, education, church complex formulated by the Rev. Pere Fritz LaFontant and Dr. Paul Farmer of Partners in Health, Boston Mass. This is a location profiled in the book Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder. During the course hours in Sewanee, students are partnering with local citizens examining such issues as education, health care, legal aid, and vocational training.

Dental and Medical Mission in Haiti, Spring Break- Local dentist Bruce Baird, his wife Sandy, and local doctor, Diane Petrilla will be offering free dental and medical clinics in rural Haiti. The doctors will be providing instruction to students while preforming service.

Other Spring break opportunities include:

Working in the Cloud Forest School in Monteverde, Costa Rica
Assisting with community development in Quito, Ecuador
Working with HIV/Aids clients in New York City
Multiple service agency assistance in Miami, Florida
Post-Katrina construction in New Orleans, Louisiana

How to contribute
Please mail donations to:
The Outreach Office
S.P.O. 1276
735 University Ave.
Sewanee, TN 337383

No Sewanee volunteer is denied the ability to go on these trips because of their inability to pay. Your gift will help pay for airfare, room and board and will provide the opportunity for a student to engage in an activity that may help shape their service education and vocational discernment at Sewanee.

Used van donated to Haiti Episcopal University

On Saturday, September 30, 2006 Outreach Coordinator Dixon Myers and former students Matt Hess and James Mason delivered the 1991 Toyota Van to Miami, Florida to be shipped to the Episcopal University of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The University there uses the van for transporting students to and from the college.

University of the South students loaded the vehicle with school supplies. Many thanks go out to Kathryn Glenn and Claire Roberts for their efforts.

Personnel of the Haitian-American owned and operated shipping line Sea-Linkton were very hospitable to the Sewanee group allowing them a tour of their operation and of one of their ships.

This is part of the Sewanee/Haiti Initiative dedicated to assisting its international partners.

Volunteering Grows in Popularity Among College Students, Study Says
Taken from The Chronicle of Higher Education – Today’s News
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
By Elibeth F. Farrell

Today's college students are volunteering in greater numbers than those of just a few years ago, according to a report released on Monday by the Corporation for National and Community Service, the federal agency that oversees AmeriCorps. The agency's researchers found that 3.3 million college students, or 30 percent of all students ages 16 to 24 at American colleges, had donated their time to various causes in 2005, compared with 2.7 million, or 28 percent of all students, in 2002.

The report, "College Students Helping America," is based on a study of data from the Current Population Survey, which began tracking volunteer rates for college students in 2002. Volunteer rates of students from earlier years are not available.

The proportional increase in student volunteerism is more than double the rate of growth in the number of young people attending college, the report says. While there was a 20 percent rise in the number of college-student volunteers from 2002 to 2005, it says, the number of 16- to 24-year-olds attending college increased by only 8 percent over the same three-year period.

"There seems to be a lot of things driving this uptick," said Robert T. Grimm, director of research and policy development for the corporation. He pointed to "a surge in service-learning programs" in elementary and secondary schools, and noted that a large proportion of college students in 2005 would have been in high school at the time of the 2001 terrorist attacks. The national response to that event "could have possibly led them to be more service-oriented," he said.

The most popular volunteer activities for students in 2005 were tutoring and mentoring programs, with the latter especially popular among black students. Some 39 percent of African-American students who volunteered donated their time to mentorship programs, compared with 22.3 percent of white students, the report says. Nearly a third of all college-student volunteers served with educational or youth-service organizations, and 23 percent of student volunteers participated through religious organizations.

Alternative spring-break trips, which give students the opportunity to use their vacation time to participate in a weeklong volunteering activity, have also grown significantly in popularity, according to Mr. Grimm.

Although many students now work while attending college, having part-time job responsibilities apparently makes them more likely to volunteer. Among students who worked one to 10 hours per week, 46 percent volunteered, and 35 percent of those who worked 11 to 15 hours a week volunteered, the study found. Students who were not employed were the least likely to donate their time, with only 29.8 percent volunteering.

In tandem with the report, the group also named 141 colleges that have earned community-service honors from the President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll. Of those colleges, six earned top recognition, including California State University-Monterey Bay, Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis, and Elon University in North Carolina.

Last updated on February 9, 2007 by Tom Howick