Volunteer opportunities to give back to the community throughout the holiday season

The holiday season is all about giving back to the community. There are endless opportunities for students or families to help out. Some of these activities include volunteering at a soup kitchen, donating clothes and distributing food.

The Black Student Union is an inclusive club that holds meetings every Wednesday morning. Their meetings include discussions on a variety of topics, including racism or colorism. President Madison Duff ’23 is holding a food drive this season.

“Right now we are doing a food drive, and I hope we can do more things in person as well,” Duff said. “We are collecting food until (Dec.) 20. Then we have a day or two to package the food and drive it over.”

Although the Union focuses more on discussions and interactive activities with the school, such as painting the rock and decorating a banner for Black History Month, the club also involves themselves in projects according to Duff.

“We plan on doing more activities soon after break or talking more about what we plan on doing for Black History Month,” Duff said.

Students attending Grosse Pointe South can also give by joining the Interact Club. President Olivia Guzman ’22 leads the club meetings and finds new service projects.

“Our main goal is to discover putting “service above self” by helping others in our community,” Guzman said. “We have meetings every other Wednesday in room 297. Anyone can sign up to volunteer for opportunities discussed during each meeting or they can receive information from the remind @gpsinte to 810-10.”

Guzman said any student may attend a meeting and lend a helping hand this Christmas.

“We recently packed lunches for the homeless in Detroit,” Guzman said. “At our upcoming meeting we are looking to make Christmas Cards for The Helm, an assisted living home, which can be continued throughout Christmas Break. After Christmas break we are looking into projects like volunteering at animal shelters and helping at food banks.”

There are opportunities all around the community for students to volunteer. Arts and Scraps, Motor City Mitten Mission, Gleaners and more organizations can benefit from receiving student help this season. The Gleaners Mercado Food Distribution Center provides households with access to sufficient, nutritious food and related resources. Organizers at the center said they collect donations, and the volunteers collect, sort and distribute the food to neighbors. Volunteers may help out by signing up on the Gleaners Mercado Website.

“Volunteer activities include helping load shopping carts indoors, and loading food into vehicles outdoors,” event coordinator Julie Ptasznik said.