On the evening of Wednesday, September 3, 2014, I attended the women’s soccer game against Salisbury University. Being a freshman and a former soccer player, I found this event very enjoyable and a great way to end my first day of classes. Attending a sporting event at Stockton is a great way to feel a sense of community with the rest of the people on campus. Whether you are there with a group of old friends or just meeting someone for the first time, you are all there for the same purpose: to cheer on the Stockton Ospreys!

This women’s soccer game was a great way for freshman to meet and make connections outside of the Welcome week setting. I planned to see the game with a few friends, but I also met a number of other awesome people. It was great to witness how a group of complete strangers could connect over a soccer game just moments after meeting one another. Shortly after introducing ourselves, we were already working together to shout support for our girls on the field.

Unfortunately, our cheering did not do the trick and they lost with a score of 3-0. Although the women’s soccer team did not get the win that day, I would say the fans in the stands did by coming together and sending all sorts of encouragement out to the players. Being a supporter at an event like this one was a great experience. I plan on attending many more athletic events on campus, as they are a great way to show off my Stockton pride!

Dana Fellerman

GEN 1033, Honors: Life of the Mind

Dr. McGovern

9.18.2014

On Thursday September 18^th, 2014 the American Red Cross was hosting a two day blood drive at Big Blue on the Stockton campus. I had registered to be a blood donor during Welcome Week when the Red Cross had a table set up looking for potential volunteers. Before coming to Stockton I have donated blood quite a few times during my high school career to the Blood Center of New Jersey and I was overjoyed knowing I can still help donate as the American Red Cross does blood drives in the fall and spring semesters in two day intervals. Waking up this morning I proceeded to follow the basic steps prior to donating blood which included drinking plenty of water, eating a good breakfast and having a snack before donation times to reduce the likeliness of becoming ill or dizzy.

My appointment was at noon, so I proceeded to head over a few minutes early to get my check in done before waiting to have a check up to make sure I was qualified to be a donor today. When I was all ready to donate, the medical instructors were very nice and helped me get settled in before proceeding to stick the needle into my arm to donate blood. As the procedure went on, I had very nice conversations with instructors and a donor laying across from me on another bed. When I was finished I sat down with the other donors and volunteers to have snacks to replenish our blood sugars while we chatted with each other before departing to live our college campus lives or go to class.

I love to volunteer in blood drives; being part of a blood drive is one of the best experiences a person can attend to because you are donating to help save a life and give blood to someone who really needs it in the hospital. The medical instructors are here to ensure everyone who is donating has blood that is safe for donating as infected blood can contaminate other blood bags quickly and go through the donation process with the donors. Blood drives are just one of many volunteering opportunities here at Stockton on and off campus but it is one of the most important communities to help support and I will give my full support to individuals or communities in need.

I recently volunteered at the American Red Cross Blood Drive for the fall semester, which took place on September 17-18, 2014 from 10-3 pm in Big Blue. I signed up ahead of time to volunteer on the 18^th from 2-3 pm. Two other volunteers and I arrived punctually at 2 and were told to relieve the volunteers from the previous time slot at the recovery table.

At first, all we were told to do was make sure those who donated blood sat for at least 10 minutes after donating, drank some water, and ate some food. This seemed like a simple enough job, so as people started coming over to the recovery table, I made sure to ask them to sit and have something to drink and eat.

The part that caught me off guard was the fainting. The volunteers we replaced left before they could pass on the warning that, “yes, people tend to faint after donating and you should probably watch out for that.” Sitting at the table, one of the donors fainted and slid right off his chair onto the floor – this definitely flustered me. Quickly, a Red Cross member came over and handled the situation, helping the man over to a bed to lie down.

Once that happened, someone from the Red Cross kindly explained to us what signs to look for when the donors come over to the table: the color of their faces, the color of their lips, beads of sweat on the forehead. From then on, we made it clear to the donors that they should let us know how they are feeling and if they start to feel faint or nauseous. Ironically, after we learned what to look for, no one else fainted.

As 2:45 came around, the registration desk stopped accepting donors. Volunteering during the last time slot, I knew no one was coming to replace us and that there were going to be more people needing recovery after 3. The other volunteers and I chose to stay until all of the donors finished donating, even though that required staying almost another hour after our time slot ended. We all agreed that it was the right thing to do, since no one from the Red Cross could watch the recovery table while working.

The decision to stay and volunteer longer, to me, embodied service-learning extremely well. I learn about the process of giving blood medically, but that was only half of the story. I also gave a special amount of meaning to my service because the other volunteers and I went above and beyond to serve others, not because we had to, but because we wanted to.

On Saturday September 6, 2014, I attended Stockton’s semi-annual Day of Service. Day of Service is an event where several organizations meet and perform service activities on campus and at nearby locations. We arrived at the campus center at 8 a.m. where we were greeted with a free t-shirt and breakfast. We then moved to the event center to choose which organization we would be donating our time and effort to. There were so many organizations and clubs present- there was truly something that everyone would be interested in.

I chose to volunteer my time to Books without Borders, a Stockton club that collects books and sends them to people who would not otherwise have access to them, such as children in third world countries. We went out to their on-campus trailer, which was packed with boxes filled with books of all genres. Our job was to unload the trailer, organize the books by genre, and finally repackage them to send them to a country that needs them.

Overall, this experience was truly eye opening in that I never really stepped back to look at how fortunate we really are. It is amazing that we take for granted something that seems so simple and trivial as books. Books are something we have always had easy access to and do not think much of how fortunate we are to have them. They are something that we are so used to having that we don’t realize that other countries do not have the same opportunity to access them. Thanks to programs such as Books without Borders, we can help to spread knowledge and send books to children in these less fortunate countries. This enriches their learning experience and allows them to experience things they otherwise would never have the opportunity to.

Becky Paulikens

           On the night of September 16, hundreds of Stockton students gathered in the campus center to try to get a free fish. Arriving fifteen minutes early to the event was still too late; the line was already snaking around the room. Lucky for my roommate and me, we weren’t too far back in the line. After waiting for half an hour, the line still didn’t move. People began to feel anxious because they didn’t know if they were even going to get a fish (there were only 100 fish to give away). In order to remedy the situation, event leaders handed out empty fish tanks. If you received an empty tank, you were certainly receiving a fish. This allowed people to know if waiting in line was worth it. After another half hour passed, my roommate and I finally arrived at the front of the line. Our first task: place a green, plastic tree in the tank. Once secured, we filled up the bottom of the tank with multi-colored pebbles: blue, orange, green, and pink. Once settled, we moved onto the next station: decorating with tiny shells, the final touch.  After the base of our tank was to our liking, we were able to scoop out our own fish from a massive tank filled with so many goldfish. The gentleman handed the filled tank to a woman, who then placed the lid on the tank and told us how to care for our brand new house pet!

            Throughout this process, I began to take note of the atmosphere in the room. The event coordinators did a fantastic job at setting the mood for the event. The refreshments were all fish themed. There were plastic cups with goldfish crackers, blue Jello to represent water, gummy fish candy, and fried fish sticks. The location of the event had signs that displayed fish décor, with a variety of different colors. Personally, I felt the group hosted a successful event, and I thought it was such a pleasure to attend!

Dana Fellerman

GEN 1033, Honors: Life of the Mind

Dr. McGovern

9.18.2014

On Saturday September 6^th, 2014 I volunteered for Stockton’s semi-annual event called Day of Service where people sign up to do community work alongside several different groups and organizations either on campus or off campus. When arriving at the campus center to begin the day minutes before the event room was open, I signed in happily at the sign in table then went down the stairs to have a small breakfast which the staff provided before I received and changed into an official Day of Service shirt. I was ecstatic to see how many people were here that were willing to do volunteer work to help out a community.

When the doors opened, there were many choices to choose from and even more people massing into the room. Ultimately I decided to join the WaterWatch program with the Campus cleanup program they were offering today alongside a few of my campus friends that I have met during my SOAR experience as well as Welcome Week. WaterWatch is one of the many environment-friendly programs here at Stockton that aims to keep the Stockton campus and surrounding area green and clean. We were instructed to break up into groups of 10 and received gloves, trash bags, a trash pick-up device and told our assignments. My friends and I were assigned to clean the West Quad area and the areas surrounding the Campus Center. As we proceeded to the West Quad the group split off into two smaller groups to cover ground faster and more efficiently than one giant mass.

As we walked around the areas on campus, there were the occasional typical pieces of trash such as wrappers and bits of string or glass which were handled with care. The fact that Stockton has such a green campus is really amazing as it makes clean ups that are done by these environmental groups less stressful on their part. The most common trash item were cigarette butts as they were scattered in non-smoking areas such as common gathering places, the grass, smashed into parts of the pavement, or strewn about the permitted smoking gazebos as smokers carelessly or intentionally throw their used up cigarettes away on the ground or miss the cigarette disposal.

Although the morning was hot and we wore black t-shirts my friends and I had a lot of fun. We listened to music as a group and as we finished up our assigned area we helped others with their assignments before heading back to the campus center around 11 a.m. for lunch. Lunch was provided by the staff as well and during our lunch session we held a reflection session around one main topic – What did this service project mean to you? To me, this service project goes to show that something as simple as picking up trash can make a huge impact in the community. After attending the Day of Service I feel as if I have a personal sense of duty to help continue keeping Stockton a green campus by picking up trash and throwing it away properly. This Stockton experience was well worth all the work and effort put into it and it felt rewarding to give back to the Stockton Community.

Cassidy Troy

Professor McGovern

Honors Service Learning

26 September 2014

Day of Service

   On Stockton’s Day of Service, on September 6 2014, I had the privilege of working closely with The Eastern Service Workers Association (ESWA). This organization is not government owned, and not considered a charity. The members of the group are unemployed or underemployed people trying to survive. Through this association, when one member is helped, it is asked of that person to help the next member if he can. These members almost form a community to combat poverty. Members who need the necessities that many have taken for granted, such as food, water, clothing, furniture, are offered if the members need them. Also, things such as medical and dental care are provided through doctors that volunteer their time to help the people who cannot afford this care.

The team that I was a part of went into the impoverished section of Atlantic City, a major city that has been affected by the increase in job loss because many of the casinos have been going out of business. We went door-to-door asking people to join and become members of the association. We had to state that there is a small monthly fee of $0.67, completely voluntary and asked of its members, but we also noted that members pay if they can and when they can.

This was an eye-opening experience for me. I realized that obviously there are people struggling, but I was even more surprised at the fact that the people who answered the doors were not skeptical or rude, but rather positive and optimistic for the future that ESWA could help them work towards. We added around fifteen new members to the association, many with families, all willing to work to create a brighter future, an important lesson that everyone should learn. I truly enjoyed this experience because it was an active experience. I actually got to hear people’s stories and what they have been through, and what they want to do for the future, and how they want to get there.

On Saturday September 6, 2014, Stockton hosted its semi-annual Day of Service, an event in which multiple clubs and organizations gather together and allow students to participate in community service on or off campus. After arriving at the campus event room at 8 am that morning, we were provided with breakfast, a free “Stockton Serves” t-shirt, and choices to volunteer with one of many clubs/organizations attending the event.

My friends and I chose to stay on campus with WaterWatch for our first Stockton event (outside of Welcome Week). WaterWatch is a club at Stockton that focuses on service and keeping our campus and the surrounding community trash-free and environmentally friendly. Being freshmen, we had no idea what WaterWatch was or what we were going to be doing that day. We soon found out that we would be split into groups of about 10 people each and assigned different sections of campus to clean. My friends and I were grouped together and told to clean the West Quad and the area surrounding the Campus Center. Our group then split into two even smaller groups to cover our assigned ground faster and more efficiently.

Surprisingly, there wasn’t that much trash to pick up – Stockton is lucky to have such a clean campus. The only minor issue we encountered was the many scattered cigarette butts around the gazebos and in non-smoking areas.

Even though it was an extremely hot morning, we finished cleaning campus and helping other groups at 11 am. Lunch was then provided for us in the Campus Center, where we held a small reflection session. What this service project meant to us was central to our discussion. To me, this service project was a way to make a difference by doing something simple. In fact, since the Day of Service, I notice the trash around campus more and don’t hesitate to pick it up and throw it out. All in all, the experience was worth the effort and was a rewarding way to serve Stockton.