To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the student volunteer service program MOVE that pervades Saint Michael's College with an atmosphere of service to others, the program has invited the college community to participate Saturday, Sept. 20, in Saint Michael's Day of Service projects.
Partnering with the United Way, volunteers, including Saint Michael's students, faculty, staff and alumni, will spend the morning working in one or another of 11 area agencies, including the Nature Conservancy, COTS, the Red Cross, Spectrum, Ronald McDonald House, the Lund Family Center and several others.
Saint Michael's President John J. Neuhauser will speak to the volunteers at a breakfast gathering at 8:30 a.m. on
Sept. 20 in the lobby of Alliot Student Center. They will then get a send-off from Heidi St. Peter, director of MOVE and associate director of Edmundite Campus Ministry for Community Service. Patrick Gallivan and Angie Armour of the office of alumni and parent relations will also speak. On completion of their morning of service, volunteers will be treated to a campus bar-b-que on the Library green with music by the band, Abol Tabol, directed by Jerome Monachino, associate director of Edmundite Campus Ministry for Liturgical Music. (On this occasion, they may not be playing liturgical music.)
About MOVE (Mobilization of Volunteer Efforts)
Founded in 1988 through the energy of the Very Rev. Michael Cronogue, SSE, Superior General of the Society of St. Edmund, MOVE has grown from some six service programs to now providing 22 areas of service which students participate in. These range from one-time to regular weekly commitments of service, which now include some 75 percent of the Saint Michael's student population. In 1989 MOVE became the first college in the country to be named one of President George H.W. Bush's Daily Points of Light.
MOVE's goal: All MOVE programs are informed by the idea that their activities should "Forge relationships that bring together volunteers and those in need as equals, thereby eliminating the stereotypes of abstract categories such as 'homeless,' 'illiterate,' 'marginalized,' 'youth at risk' and 'refugee.'"
Saint Michael's MOVE pioneered the now-widely popular concept of Extended Service, whereby groups of about 10 students travel together over spring break to various sites around the country and the world to engage in service and to witness another reality.
Currently Saint Michael's Extended Service trips go to Selma, Ala., New Orleans, New York, Immokalee, Fla., Big Thicket Preserve in Texas, Appalachia in Kentucky, and other domestic sites, and to international sites in Kolkata, India; Ghana and Uganda.
The local programs that students participate in every week on campus include A Cause for Paws, After School Games, America Reads, Best Buddies, Corrections Volleyball, DREAM, Extended Service, Family Friends, Habitat for Humanity, International Outreach, Little Brother/Little Sister, Middle School Mentors, MOVE International, OVE, Senior Citizens, SOFA, Special Events, Temporary Relief, TREK, Wilderness Mentoring, Winooski Youth Connection, Woodside Tutoring.
Saint Michael's College, founded in 1904 by the Society of St. Edmund and headed by President John J. Neuhauser, is identified by the Princeton Review as one of the nation's Best 368 Colleges. A liberal arts, residential, Catholic college, Saint Michael's is located just outside of Burlington, Vermont, one of America's top college towns and less than two hours from Montreal. As one of only 270 institutions nationwide with a prestigious Phi Beta Kappa chapter on campus, Saint Michael's has 2,000 full-time undergraduate students, some 500 graduate students and 200 international students. In recent years Saint Michael's students and professors have received Rhodes, Woodrow Wilson, Guggenheim, Fulbright, National Science Foundation and other grants, and Saint Michael's professors have been named Vermont Professor of the Year in four of the last eight years. The college is currently listed as one of the nation's Best Liberal Arts Colleges in the 2009 U.S. News & World Report rankings.
Photo caption:
Saint Michael's student with a Senior Citizen at the annual "Senior Prom" for area Senior Citizens.
- Photo by Jerry Swope