When the summer is hot and students head home, faculty and staff might expect a chance to chill out. Instead, on many campuses across the NC Campus Compact network, community engagement doesn’t take a vacation. Colleges and universities support a wide variety of summer service opportunities – from full-time student internships with local nonprofits to special service orientation sessions for incoming first years.
Summer internship programs are a great way for students to gain meaningful experience and for nonprofit partners to staff up for special summer work. UNC-Chapel Hill’s APPLES summer internship program places about 30 students at local non-profits to work full-time for 8 to 10 weeks. Interns can earn one credit through an associated service-learning course administered by the School of Social Work, and they receive a stipend that is co-funded by APPLES and the non-profit partner.
In Queens University of Charlotte’s Summer in Service program, the summer internship experience takes a different form. Started in 2012, the program selects 5 to 10 Queens undergrads each summer to serve as a team. Over the course of the summer, the students will work with a dozen partner agencies, serving one week (Monday – Thursday) with each organization. For their service, participants receive free on-campus housing over the summer.
Queens student Karla Lozano has chronicled the 2015 team’s work in her Summer in Service blog.
“[The program] serves two purposes,” says Pat Taft, director of the Center for Active Citizenship, the office that manages Summer in Service. “It’s great for the students to find their passion but it also helps to solidify our non-profit partnerships because these are dedicated students, they stay a whole week, they build relationships, and they build Queens’ reputation with the non-profit.”
UNCG students and staff prepare for a serveGSO summer workday.
UNC Greensboro’s new serveGSO program also helps build and preserve ties with non-profit partners during the summer months. The effort began last fall as a series of one-time service projects. North Carolina Campus Compact VISTA member Kali Hackett, working with UNCG’s Office of Leadership and Service-Learning (OLSL), started the program and continues to coordinate the summer series, which focuses on sustainable food and food security.
“We had so much success with the serveGSO model during the semester,” says Hackett. “When we were talking in March about how to engage students during the summer, we decided to continue the program but focus on food. There is so much farming, people want to get outside, and food insecurity is an issue in Guilford County. We want to show students the issue firsthand.”
The Campus Kitchen program has its focus clearly on food. At Elon University, Campus Kitchen staff and volunteers grow and harvest produce at the university’s on-campus farm, then use the produce to prepare over 200 meals each Tuesday. Most of the meals are delivered and served at the Allied Churches of Alamance County’s lunchtime feeding program.
At Wake Forest University, the Campus Kitchen program is busier than ever this summer, as it continues service to its ongoing partners and adds a new feeding site: a summer camp organized by Girls, Inc. NC Campus Compact VISTA member Natasha Vos credits the Campus Kitchen student interns for handling the increased work load – 30 breakfasts and 30 lunches each day – to feed the campers. This is despite working out of a new location while Campus Kitchen’s usual space in the (serendipitously named) Kitchen Residence Hall is being renovated.
On the food acquisition side of the Campus Kitchen mission, Vos has brokered a new partnership with Farmer Foodshare to purchase low-cost produce left on the stands at local farmers markets. The food can be re-used in Campus Kitchen meals or distributed to other partners.
Many campuses offer special service experiences for incoming first years. Elon University’s Pre-Serve program brings 25 new students to campus in June for a week-long, whirlwind community service tour.
Evan Small, Assistant Director for Student Programs at Elon’s Kernodle Center, directs Pre-Serve but points out the effort is a collaboration between many campus offices, including Greek Life, Residence Life, Campus Rec, and others.
Elon’s Pre-Serve program lets incoming students learn about the campus and community.
“The program introduces these new students to the university as a whole, to different organizations and communities within Alamance County, and to the multiplicity of options available for them to get involved,” says Small.
New students and transfers can take part in UNC-Chapel Hill’s Service-Learning Initiative, which runs for 3 days before fall classes begin. About 60 new students and 18 student leaders take part in the student-led, staff-supported orientation-style program. Participants move into their dorms early and pay a nominal fee of $60 to cover meals and transportation.
This year, student organizers chose to focus the experience on a unifying theme: “Food for All.” Participants will serve with food-related partner organizations and hear from guest speakers and experts as they learn about the campus and community life. The students take away real knowledge of the issue and partner organizations can accomplish special projects, but APPLES and related campus programs benefit as well.
“It’s kind of a leadership pipeline for us,” says Ryan Nilsen, a program officer at the Carolina Center for Public Service. “We find that about half of APPLES student organizers were part of SLI. So it’s one way that we’re trying to reach students early and bringing them in as potential student leaders.”
Update 7/23/2015:
We also wanted to share these amazing service programs making a difference this summer in North Carolina and beyond. :
UNC Pembroke Summer Community Internship Program – The North Carolina State Employees Credit Union Foundation has agreed to provide 20 student internships for UNC Pembroke students this summer, with a total investment of up to $100,000. Under the program, SECU interns will help local governments, non-profit organizations, businesses and other agencies in this rural community.
Elon Academy – a college access and success program for academically promising high school students in Alamance County with a financial need and/or no family history of college. The Academy includes three consecutive summer residential experiences prior to the sophomore, junior and senior years, as well as year-round Saturday programs for students and families.
The Campus Kitchen at East Carolina University – like Campus Kitchen programs at Elon and Wake Forest, the Campus Kitchen at ECU keeps feeding hungry kids and families over the summer with help from summer student interns and local volunteers.
DukeEngage – provides full funding for select Duke undergraduates who wish to pursue an immersive summer of service in partnership with a U.S. or international community. As of summer 2015, more than 3,000 Duke students have volunteered through DukeEngage in 79 nations on six continents. A former DukeEngage project near and dear to our VISTA program’s heart is the Partnership for Appalachian Girls Education in Madison, NC.
Please send your campus highlights of summer engagement to nccc@elon.edu.