Fight The Blight Volunteer Day

The next Fight the Blight Volunteer Day is Saturday, March 19, 2011 from 10:00am-1:00pm.  Fight The Blight project is a great partnership between the city, neighborhood organizations, non-profits and volunteers from throughout the community.  Help out this weekend! The project will be targeting a five block radius of open schools, playgrounds, and high traffic commercial corridors.


The five locations for the 2nd “Fight the Blight” Volunteer Day will be:

• Harrell Stadium, 2400 Leonidas St. (District A)
• Taylor Park, 3101 Washington Ave. (District B)
• Cut Off Center, 6600 Belgrade St. (District C)
• St. Bernard Center, 2500 Filmore Avenue (District D)
• Sampson Playground, 3101 Louisa St. (District E)

Activities will include litter abatement, strategic demolitions, grass-cutting, neighborhood beautification, code citing, and painting. Volunteers are encouraged to bring gloves. 

Please join the efforts. To volunteer for this Saturday’s effort, sign up online Click Here. 



*Photo Credit: http://globalgreen.org/blogs/holycross/life-in-the-nine/fight-the-blight-day-in-holy-cross/*  

Pledge Community Service in 2011

It’s a new year! We made it to 2011 and just like you we are excited for this new beginning. I know everyone is thinking about New Year’s resolutions, but I have a different idea for you. To me 2011 is the year of pledges. Pledge community service and awareness. Take a pledge to do community service hours and give back to the community that has given us so much. Being an active part of the community will help us reach the next step in our city’s recovery.

Recently, I had the chance to volunteer for two dynamic organizations, The Arc and The Green Project. With the Loyola Alumni “Wolves on the Prowl” program alumni and students alike across the city volunteered in different capacities, sharing the Loyola passion for service. Through this program I had the chance to volunteer at the Arc, an organization serving people with intellectual disabilities, sorting beads. I HAD A GREAT EXPERIENCE! Not only did I have a chance to learn about the Arc but also to experience the great history of Mardi Gras through all the beads and medallions.

For my birthday week I volunteered with the Green Project, a non-profit dedicated to promoting environmental sustainability. I learned more about the Green Project, stuffed envelopes and got to know some fantastic people. I loved it so much that I went back to help out again and to get to know more great folks!

Volunteering isn’t just great for the organization, but is a great chance to learn. It is a wonderful way to become aware of awesome things in New Orleans as well as meet new people.

Tell us how many hours will you do this year and/or projects. ( Remember! no matter how small or big all help is major, helping your neighbors to construction projects make a difference)

*photo credit: Photobucket*

City Year Encourages Generation Y to Give a Year and Change the World

Everybody knows one. They were the straight A students in high school who found time to volunteer every weekend with Salvation Army and Habitat for Humanity. Some call then “Do Gooders” and overachievers; they call themselves social entrepreneurs. They are a select group of teens and 20-somethings who have taken a passion for community service to the next level. Generation Y has faced criticisms from its elders for being self-indulgent and unmotivated texting addicts. I recently had the opportunity to meet a group of young people who are going against the grain and have committed one year to make a positive difference in the New Orleans community.

City Year Louisiana (http://www.cityyear.org/louisiana.aspx) is a division of AmeriCorps that charges people between 17 and 24 to take a year off from college or career to work with struggling students in New Orleans and Baton Rouge schools. These Corps members put their lives—and incomes—on hold to move across the country and work on a poverty stipend. Each workday is spent tutoring, mentoring, calling parents, planning with instructors and facilitating service projects. Their mission is to keep kids in school, teach the importance of giving back and becoming a trusted friend and mentor to each child they work with. The formula is working in New Orleans: Walter L. Cohen High School has seen its graduation rates spike from a shocking 33% in 2007 to 96% in 2009 with the help of Corps members.

So why do they do it? Is it Generation Y guilt or to make the rest of us feel bad? In the words of one Corps member: “I can’t give my money but I can give my time.” Positively changing the next generation will benefit our communities later on. As we approach 2011, I plan to add, “Become a social entrepreneur” to my resolutions along with going to the gym and cutting out junk food. I may not be ready for the yearlong commitment and poverty stipend, but I am inspired to eventually become one of these overachievers and help create a better New Orleans.