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The sorority Alpha Gamma Delta volunteered at a variety of community service events and organizations throughout their Week of Service.
Week of Service is a full week where all Alpha Gamma Deltas across the nation do community service for a full week. This year it was Feb 13th-19th. For our chapter, Sunday we made tie dog blankets for the humane society. Monday, we volunteered at Lord’s Diner here in Pittsburg. Tuesday, we did “Manis for Grannies’ ‘ where we went to the nursing home and painted nails for the residents and just kind of hung out with them. Wednesday, we did a supply drive for the Lafayette house over in Joplin. They are a women’s shelter and we donated feminine hygiene products as well as blankets,” said Freshman in graphic communications and director of community service Megan Brownell. “Thursday’s event was supposed to be Lord’s Diner again but was canceled because of the ice. To make up for it, girls wrote cards to the nursing home. Friday, we volunteered at Wesley House here in Pittsburg, where we packaged spaghetti meals. Saturday was the last day, where we did a food drive for the gorilla pantry.”
The events had no set theme, but the sororities international philanthropy is Fighting Hunger.
“I think that the Gorilla Pantry always needs help, and the Lafayette House was a new one for us, so we were really excited to contribute to them and we really liked what they stand for with helping women and that kind of thing. It’s kind of what sorority revolves around too. And we got a lot of donations for them too, so I think that both of those opportunities as well as the hands-on Community service type thing is always a really good opportunity. We love helping the community. It’s something that we always are excited to do,” said Paige Unruh, junior in nursing and president of Alpha Gamma Delta.
There were some new community service events that Alpha Gamma Delta volunteered at, and some that were new for the chapter’s week of service.
I chose to make blankets because in the past, they have always made dog toys, so I wanted to change it up a bit. And we do work with the humane society as well and I knew blankets would be easy and fun. For the Lord’s Diner, that is our number 1 place we work within our philanthropy. We have always volunteered there in the past whether it’s for a week of service or not, so I was able to get 2 days since it is popular within our chapter. For Tuesday’s event, one of the girls in my chapter gave me the idea as they had done it in the past and I thought it was a great idea, and people in nursing homes aren’t able to go get their nails done often. For Wednesday, we decided on Lafayette House as it is a women’s shelter and as a sorority, we want to support women who are in need of help, so donating to them was perfect,” said Brownell. “For the Wesley House, they serve the homeless as well and have a food pantry, so it worked perfect for our philanthropy, and they don’t have volunteers often. And lastly for the gorilla pantry, this affects students here on campus directly, and ones that can’t afford food. We had done this last year and it had a great turnout and when taking the donations there on Monday, I saw it was low, so it was a perfect thing that worked out.”
All members of the sorority are required to volunteer at least three hours during the week of service.
“There’s definite benefits to every type of community service and I hope that our members just can appreciate not only helping others, but just being grateful for what we like are able to do and in helping our community and just being grateful that we have the opportunity to help others,” said Unruh.
Megan Brownell works for the Collegio as a photojouranlist.