January 17, 2002
1,100 from UW answer service call
This year’s Martin Luther King, Jr., Day of Service is expected to draw 1,100 participants from the UW community.
Volunteers will gather at 8:30 a.m. on Monday, Jan. 21 at ByGeorge cafe for complementary food and T-shirts donated by the University Book Store. At 9 a.m. they will hear remarks by President Richard L. McCormick, English Professor Charles Johnson and Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels. Then they will set off for activities at sites provided by United Way of King County. Volunteers come from UW, Bothell and UW, Tacoma as well as the Seattle campus.
The response from the UW surprised and gratified Gail Gautestad, public relations coordinator in University Relations. “We were a little late in notifying people of the volunteer opportunity, so I expected about 500 to sign up. In my wildest dreams I didn’t expect we’d have 1,000 volunteers. We finally had to cut off accepting volunteers at 1,100.” Campuswide e-mails invited faculty, staff and students to volunteer at the Web site, http://depts.washington.edu/mlkjr/. As of last week, Gautestad was still working with United Way to match the last volunteers with community agencies.
The volunteers are organized in 84 teams; each designated team leader is supposed to manage the logistics with the agency of the work to be done, supplies that are needed and transportation.
The Day of Service is a nationwide phenomenon created when President Clinton signed the King Holiday and Service Act in 1994. Gov. Gary Locke added a Washington state component to the program last year. His office coordinates service activities by other state agencies.
For some UW individuals, volunteering is a way of life. Team leader Kristine Genovese, who works at UWTV, was employed at United Way when she lived in Albuquerque, N.M. “I enjoy the fact that I might make things a little easier for people who may not have the same advantages I had,” she says. “It gives me a sense of purpose and fulfillment that I may not get in my everyday job.” Genovese’s team, composed chiefly of people from UWTV, will be helping out at New Horizon School.
Melinda Young, health and safety coordinator for the Regional Primate Research Center, has extensive volunteer experience. She has been involved in Girl Scouts for 12 years, as a trainer, in helping other adults become involved in Girl Scouts, and most intensively with cookie sales. She also volunteers with her son’s Boy Scout troop, at her church, and in science and math education for girls at Highline Community College. “I believe volunteering in the community is very important,” she says. “I looked into the Web site and decided it was something that I could do with my son, who is 14 and needs some community service hours for a Boy Scout advancement. I think the concept of a day on and not a day off is an important concept to teach our children.” Her team will be volunteering at the Center for Human Services.
For Noelle Liberato, a research technologist in the Department of Environmental Health, this is her first time participating in the Day of Service, but she plans to make it an annual event. “I’m volunteering because I think it’s important to take time out of our busy lives and devote a day to helping worthwhile causes,” she says. “I have the luxury of having the day off and contributing to a community project that makes me feel useful and appreciative of what I have.” Liberato’s team will be working at the Children’s Home Society.
Sarah Hipskind, a program assistant at Odegaard Undergraduate Library, says she would like to volunteer more frequently but, because she works more than one job has trouble fitting a regular volunteer activity into her schedule. So the Day of Service fits well into her constraints. “I suppose you could say I have years of weak desires to give back to the community building up, and they’ve only recently built up into something strong enough to drive me to action.” Hipskind contacted a group of friends and like-minded colleagues, who will spend the day at the Ruth Dykeman Children’s Center.
