Union College Students Serve in New York, New Jersey

As most of their classmates spent Fall Break at Union College preparing for upcoming athletic events or traveling home to see their families, thirteen students loaded a van and departed Barbourville to do service work in New Jersey and New York. The students, eight Bonner Scholars and five student volunteers, assisted in various capacities during their weekend in the Northeast.

The students, accompanied by Lisa Jordan-Payne, Vice President for Student Life, Lee Ann Luxenberger, Director of Common Partners, and Becky Trask, Director of Student Activities and Leadership, arrived in Princeton, New Jersey early Friday morning. There, they delivered "warm fuzzies" and letters from third graders at G.R. Hampton to an elementary school that lost three fathers who worked in the Twin Towers in the events of September 11. The class receiving the letters wrote back to the Hampton children that day. They also delivered support banners made by Union College students, faculty and staff and the First United Methodist Church of Barbourville to the Bonner Foundation. Foundation staffers will present the Barbourville banners, along with those made per Union's request by other Bonner Scholars institutions, to a Princeton police officer who will hang them in a Red Cross/Salvation Army facility at Ground Zero. Later, the group volunteered at St. John's Bread and Life food pantry in Brooklyn, performing necessary cleaning, painting, and food stocking tasks for the organization which feeds over 500 people a day. The students then toured Greenwich Village, rode the Staten Island Ferry, went up the Empire State Building, and walked down Times Square.

On Saturday, the students volunteered on a gleaning project with AmeriCorps members from Rider University and Middlesex Community College. The project was sponsored by Farmers Against Hunger, an initiative of the New Jersey Agricultural Society. The student volunteers collectively picked over 9,000 pounds of cabbage, brussel sprouts, and broccoli that was served that night in local New Jersey soup kitchens. After the project, the students had dinner with Mrs. Corella A. Bonner, the founder of the Bonner Foundation who sponsors the Bonner Scholars Program, and then took the night off to explore Princeton, home of the Bonner Foundation, and enjoy the company of their new friends from Rider University.

On the 13-hour drive back to Barbourville, the group drove through downtown Washington, D.C. There, they saw all of the major capital landmarks including the White House and the Washington Monument. They also drove right past the Pentagon and were able to see first-hand the damage inflicted upon the building on September 11.

Union College students attending the trip to New Jersey and New York included: Chris Bowling, Crystal Bowling, Jennifer Bryant, Karen Caldwell, Jon Causey, Karisha Couch, Jennifer Fields, Jessica Fields, Malesore Hajdini, Chris Howard, Jessica Mullins, Rion Smith, and Skyler York.

November 19, 2001

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