Dominique Thomas, Freshman, Elementary Education
For change day I couldn’t figure out what to do until my sister asked me to join her to go with the Architecture group. If I’m being honest, I wasn’t 100% sure about what activities I was signing up to participate in. We arrived in Benton Harbor where a woman named Ms. Ashley explained what we were helping with. They didn’t have a grocery store or small market near their neighborhood so she started a garden where people that lived around would come and help harvest and grow food there for each other. Unfortunately since school started back up people had more responsibilities and things to do, so not a lot of people were able to help out to keep it intact. That’s where we come in! We came to just help them clean the garden backup and restore what was there. I had a really fun time and a great experience working with the vegetable gardens and doing something out of my comfort zone. I also got to help out the community and help make a change!
Renee Wisdom, Freshman, Photography
My change day experience was one of the longest days of the semester. This year I gained the position of PR on AUSA’s team. Change day was an event AUSA hosted this year and all members had to be present at 6:45 a.m. Having soccer practice and homework the night before the wake up was rough, but nonetheless I was on time. As VP of Public Relations, I had to gain content all day for not only Change Day but for the after party as well. Running around everywhere helping with setup and catching footage was a very stressful thing. In addition to setting up, I had to run to take photos for BSCF at their car wash. This task wasn’t hard, but finding the time and taking pictures efficiently was sort of a struggle. All day I was trying to figure out how I would travel to BSCF’s car wash, I finally asked my coworker and she said “I’ll drop you off with the golf cart” (Sara Santana, Psychology Major). This was extremely helpful because I would’ve had to walk to Apple Valley to help support them. I can say the best time that I had was at the Change Day after party, there were a lot of fun things going on and filming footage was a blast. If I could change anything I would change how much sleep I got so I felt rested for the day.
Amanda Park, Freshman, Explore Andrews
All of my friends signed up to go to Love Creek because of the Biology extra credit, so I signed up for it, too. Honestly speaking, I had a very tiring week, with very little sleep. So I was reluctant to go, but went anyway. Initially, I thought we were going to an actual creek with running water but was relieved when I found out that we would not be going near running water. The chores we did were fairly simple: picking up trash and removing the invasive plant that was taking over, honeysuckle. My friends and I walked about a mile picking up trash and it was so therapeutic. Where I’m from there isn’t a spot that I’ve found where I can’t hear the noise of busy life. Besides the six cars that drove past us, there was utter silence. We got to see wildflowers, birds, multiple corn fields, and the beautiful sky.
After we finished picking up trash we joined the rest of the group in removing the honeysuckle by breaking sticks and crushing up leaves. This was another therapeutic activity, breaking the sticks. Something about this reminded me of a rage room, where a person just breaks and ruins things to let out rage. Overall, I’m still pretty tired but glad that I went out today.
The Student Movement is the official student newspaper of Andrews University. Opinions expressed in the Student Movement are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors, Andrews University or the Seventh-day Adventist church.