It was back to books and classrooms today, but on Saturday hundreds of Palm Beach Atlantic University students showed up ready to work for the betterment of the community.
More than 300 first-year students and student leaders, as well as some faculty and staff, served in eight locations in and around West Palm Beach in a community service effort that has become a Welcome Week tradition. The projects included cleaning up a city park, maintaining the animal habitats at the zoo, working at a local food bank and painting the home of a 79-year-old widow, among others.
One group of students teamed with volunteers from Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church in West Palm Beach to host a back-to-school block party for neighborhood children.
Helping to coordinate the event were Palm Beach Atlantic alumni Kevin Jones ’07, who serves on Tabernacle’s pastoral team, and Cassie Clark ’14, who works with the neighborhood youth.
Neighborhood residents look forward to the event each year, Jones said. “It’s a time to love on the community and encourage them at the beginning of the school year and to let them know we care about them,” he said.
Another local church where PBA students served was Hope Fellowship Community Church, also in West Palm Beach. Students assisted with such tasks as power washing the exterior of the building, relocating a patio area and beautifying a playground. Inside, they washed windows, vacuumed carpets and cleaned the sanctuary.
“The students who came to our church were hardworking, positive and real-life examples of what it means to be the hands and feet of Jesus,” Pastor Jason Leadingham said. “Our church campus was greatly enhanced in a relatively short amount of time. It also encouraged the people from our church to see these young adults serving God and others so passionately.”
Community of Hope in Loxahatchee also received help from 28 PBA volunteers, who did construction projects, such as rebuilding a roof on a stable, to help the church prepare for its Christmas “Back to Bethlehem” event. The students also pulled weeds and trimmed shrubs, and inside they installed stage lighting in the church’s children’s area.
The city of West Palm Beach was another beneficiary of the Workship day. Students cleared litter and assisted with vegetation maintenance at Dreher Park, a large city park located near PBA’s Rinker Athletic Campus.
City officials said they look forward to having the students come back each August.
“Palm Beach Atlantic's volunteers always impress us with their willingness to pitch in and work hard,” said Rhonda Barona, the city’s recreation manager. “The City of West Palm Beach has come to rely on PBA to work with us on some of the largest and most complicated projects that have greatly enhanced the city’s parks system.”
The students themselves said they were pleased to have had a chance to serve in a meaningful way.
Meredith Kercher, a freshman human performance and sport major from Ipswich, Massachusetts, said she enjoyed spending time with the children at the block party.
“I can see God through their eyes,” she said. “Their energy gives me energy.”
Grant Nedlik, a freshman pre-nursing major from Binghamton, New York, also volunteered at the block party. He said he was pleased to learn earlier in the day that the Workship program is approaching 3 million hours of service to the community since PBA’s founding in 1968.
Nedlik grew up with a strong foundation of service to others. “That was one of the things that drew me to PBA,” he said.
Director of Workship Kate Magro said that all of the sites where students served on Saturday have weekly volunteer opportunities for students during the school year.
More information about Workship is available at www.pba.edu/workship.
