2,000 SC Volunteers To Tackle Community Projects On ‘Humanics In Action Day’

SPRINGFIELD, Mass., Sept. 20, 2004 –Wielding weed whackers, paint brushes, shovels, and tutorial equipment, 2,000 Springfield College students and members of the faculty and staff will tackle more than 100 projects in the community in a day of concentrated service, Thursday, September 23, 2004, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

For its annual Humanics In Action Day, Springfield College will cancel daytime classes and operate offices with reduced staffing to free college volunteers to work on projects throughout the community, but primarily in neighborhoods surrounding its campus. College work groups wearing maroon tee shirts will help neighbors with a variety of clean-up/fix-up projects, spruce-up playgrounds and vacant lots, remove graffiti, conduct educational projects in schools, and perform a variety of indoor and outdoor projects. Springfield College volunteers will pitch in for more than 70 schools, shelters, churches, senior citizens’ facilities, city agencies, community organizations, and individual neighbors.

In one project that has become an annual tradition with residents of Westford Circle, 30 students, led by Springfield College Professor Peter Polito and neighbor Irma Foster, will clean and plant the islands in the center of the road.

Following the event, the college will host a cookout for its volunteers, neighborhood residents, and members of cooperating community organizations and city departments beginning at 1 p.m. at Blake Track on the campus.

Springfield College initiated Humanics In Action Day in September 1998 as a demonstration of its humanics philosophy that emphasizes education of the whole person in spirit, mind and body for leadership in service to others. The event augments the college’s year-round service programs in which students enhance their classroom learning by performing service projects related to their studies in schools, neighborhood organizations, and city programs. Humanics in Action Day initiators were student leaders of the New Student Orientation and Distinguished Professor of Humanics Peter Polito. The college has held service days at various times throughout its history. The earliest example on record was in 1918.

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