More than 100 Boston University Students will spend their Spring Break doing something most will avoid at all costs: work.
These students are participants in the Community Service Center’s Alternative Spring Breaks program.
Established in 1987, the program gives students the opportunity to spend their Spring Breaks drug and alcohol-free, while giving back to a community.
Ten groups of students will drive to different states and work with organizations this year, including Habitat for Humanity, Teach for America, Volunteers of America and the Nature Conservatory, said the program’s manager, Carly Bruder.
The number of scheduled trips is greater this year, Bruder said, because of increased student interest and participation.
Volunteer sites for this year’s program include Abington, Va., Cumberland Island, Ga., Florida City and Hobe Sound, Fla., Liberty, Miss., Louisburg, N.C., Nashville, Tenn., New Orleans, La., Oklahoma City, Okla. and St. Louis, Mo.
Students will spend the week participating in a variety of charitable activities, including environmental clean-up and house restoration and construction. Other students will tutor and work with disabled children.
‘I think that this is a good program because it allows students who may not otherwise have the time to volunteer to do so,’ Bruder said. ‘I don’t know of any other program at BU where you can put 13 strangers together and nine days later have a group of great friends and a lifetime of memories.’
Bruder will travel to Hobe Sound this year to assist the Blowing Rocks Nature Conservancy with habitat restoration, evasive plant removal and irrigation work.
‘ASB has taught me a lot about teamwork and the importance of volunteering,’ Bruder said.
Last year, College of Arts and Sciences junior Alicia Riley was a site manager in Florida City and this year she will travel to Cumberland Island to aid in an environmental clean-up project.
‘[ASB] opens up opportunities you wouldn’t normally see,’ Riley said. ‘It makes you see a completely different way of life than what you see in Boston.’
Riley worked with immigrant workers last year, which she said was an interesting experience.
‘We worked with migrant farm workers which was really awesome,’ Riley said. ‘I got to experience what it was like to live there.’
Other than having incredible experiences during the week of volunteerism, Riley said the friendships that were formed have endured outside of the program.
‘The cool part is that when the trip was over, no one wanted to get out of the car,’ Riley said. ‘You make great friends.’
Participants in the program pay a $200 fee that covers food, transportation, housing and program fees, program officials said.