Unexpected Insight into What We Have
Corps Members Mallory Falk and Amanda Gross
Although the city of New Orleans has been super busy with the Super Bowl, elections, Mardi Gras, work, visitors, and a variety of other fun events, I have been given the additional opportunity of planning for a group of 16 Northeastern Hillel students to come down for an alternative Spring Break trip February 28th-March 7th. I will be co-leading this trip with another Elon University graduate who works for Northeastern Hillel. He had contacted me a while ago to ask if I would be interested in leading with him because the group wanted to be a part of the rebuilding process and he knew that I worked for Rebuilding Together New Orleans (an organization that rebuilds the houses of low-income homeowners who are either elderly, disabled, single guardians of minor children, or first responders).
I eagerly accepted the offer because it was a combination of so many of the things I love. I was particularly excited to have been offered an opportunity to work with Hillel students interested in service, as someone who specifically has moved down to New Orleans to do community service work in a Jewish context. I jumped at the chance to be able to combine the passion I have for my job with the chance to find ways for individuals to get the most out of a volunteer experience. Additionally, I thought it would be a really great chance to flip my usual role as a participant in alternative spring break trips/service oriented programs and use the knowledge I had acquired during those experiences to create a program for these students.
I hadn’t realized until I began the speaking with the student leader for the group regarding the planning just how much I truly enjoyed this type of work. As the days get closer and closer to when they get here and I realize all the last minute things that need to be done, I get more excited for all that we are going to be able to do. This surprising amount of enthusiasm I’ve felt has had a profound effect on me for two reasons. The first dealt with the realization that maybe this could be something I look into for future employment or just as something to keep in mind in case the opportunity arises again. The second was that it reminded me why I chose to do Avodah in the first place. I knew that I wanted to do service for a year after graduating from college and had looked at a number of different service organizations before deciding on Avodah. Ultimately, I chose what I felt would be the best organization for giving me context for the service work I was doing. I did not want my work to just be a job. I wanted it to be an experience; a job plus an understanding and insight into how that job fits into the context of everything else occurring in the city. I wanted a support system outside of my job that I could find in the community of other volunteers I would be living with.
Avodah has been exactly what I had wanted in this regard. I love seeing how the work I am doing is interconnected with the work of my housemates. However, this was never something I thought about on a daily basis. Sure, I have been incredibly grateful for being a part of Avodah for many reasons, but planning for Northeastern has given my an entirely new appreciation for what a wonderful expereince Avodah has been for me. I have re-discovered how important it is to have that additional context for service work though my time spent making decisions on the speakers/activities/events that would give the Northeastern students the best supplement to their service.
I feel incredibly grateful that I have had the ability to do more than go through the motions of my daily tasks in the office and am thrilled that to have the chance to give these students a similar experience where they can connect with their work on a more meaningful level. Or at least attempt to provide programs that will allow them to do this.
I know that I have a tendency to go off on tangents, but my ultimate point is this: in planning for the trip for the Northeastern students, I have unexpectedly found myself in appreciation of the experience I am currently enjoying in New Orleans and have realized how much I like trying to find a way to incorporate that into a new experience for others to enjoy.
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Editilla~New Orleans Ladder said:
Nice. Thank you for keeping the lights on New Orleans!
Your “Corps” is definitely part of the solution, making the bigger difference.