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APO, a service fraternity, is helping clean up local roadways. |
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Sociology Professor and Coordinator of SERVE Reber Dunkel |
10/18/11
Randolph-Macon College’s chapter of
Alpha Phi Omega (APO), a service fraternity, is helping clean up Hanover County’s roadways in connection with Adopt a Highway. Alpha Phi Omega was founded to extend the principles founded by the Boy Scouts of America, and its goal is to help those in need and promote peace through service.
Adopt A Highway is an initiative under the aegis of the Public Works Department that helps keeps Virginia roadways in our local community clean and free of litter. APO student volunteers, along with fraternity members from
Kappa Alpha and
Sigma Phi Epsilon, pick up trash several times a year along a three-mile-long stretch of road near the college.
To read more SERVE stories, click here. “It is a great project for the environment, and it helps with ‘brother bonding’—fraternity members finding joy in sharing a common goal,” says Jamie Grant ’12,
biology major and president of Alpha Phi Omega.
R-MC’s Adopt a Highway chapter is not limited to brothers, however. As with the majority of APO’s community-service events, new members and participants from other student organizations, fraternities, and sororities are always welcome. “We also have residents from the Town of Ashland community help out,” says Grant. “The more hands, the better.”
APO’s mission is to “prepare campus and community leaders through service,” and its values are admirable: The group aims to “develop leadership, promote friendship, and provide service.” The fraternity’s objectives—“share, grown, improve, invest—are carried out in a wide range of projects.
APO works with members of the community on projects in conjunction with: Hanover Arts, BARK (Bandit’s Adoption and Rescue of K-9s), Ashland Humane Society, CJSTUF, Relay for Life, domestic violence awareness, cancer awareness, Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, Toys for Tots, and Ashland Rescue. “We also visit and write letters to patients at children’s hospitals and we volunteer to help other campus organizations,” explains Grant.
R-MC
Sociology Professor Reber Dunkel, the coordinator of Students Engaged in Responsible Volunteer Experiences (
SERVE), says that APO’s work is a responsible, conscientious effort to help the community.
“The diverse array of the service projects that the APO members undertake in a year is extraordinary and serves as an outstanding example of what R-MC student volunteers can accomplish,” says Dunkel.
Grant joined Alpha Phi Omega because it was the first community service group she heard about when she arrived at Randolph-Macon. “The brothers seemed to genuinely care about each other and the community; I knew this was something I wanted to be a part of,” she says. “It makes me feel good to know that there are people out there who want to help each other.” She considers community service an integral part of student life.
“Class time is only part of the college experience,” she says. “The connections and interactions you get with organizations such as Alpha Phi Omega are invaluable. Being a member of APO has helped me grow in ways I never thought imaginable.”
In 2010-11, R-MC students collectively amassed almost 8,000 volunteer hours. Nearly 50 students spent an alternative Spring Break in Florida for a combined 950 hours with Habitat for Humanity and 130 hours for a Haiti Relief project. Students in R-MC’s Greek organizations contributed more than 4,500 hours of collective service to the community, collected 550 pounds of canned food, donated 60 inches of hair to Locks of Love, 21 toys to Toys for Tots and generous funds to various organizations. In addition, money was raised on campus and donated to the Red Cross & Partners in Health for the Haiti Earthquake Relief. The SERVE program, in the Office of Student Life, is an integral part of Randolph-Macon’s Leadership Development and Service Initiative.