Hello from Birmingham,
We arrived in Birmingham on Saturday night. We spent the first night meeting our host family, the Lynch's (Tom, Susan, and JuJu). They were all so nice and we loved spending time with them for our first couple of days. Sunday we met up with several Mizzou Alumni at Dave's Pizza. It was really cool seeing so many people turn out and show so much interest in what our group was doing throughout the week. After Dave's Pizza, a Mizzou alum, Nathan Marcus, gave us a tour of Birmingham and gave us a lot of great facts about the history of the city. We got to learn so much about where we were going to be working in the hour and half we spent with him.
Monday was our first day of service at Christo Rey High School. Christo Rey is a school that focuses on preparing students for college that come from low income families that would otherwise most likely not have the opportunity to go to college. Our group was involved in a number of tasks throughout the day, such as repairing desks, decorating the walls of the school, and building a fish tank for the main lobby. In order to complete some of the tasks, we had to purchase things from the store. This would have been no big deal, but we lost about 45 minutes due to Darren taking 4 wrong turns. He wasn't allowed to drive after that.
Three of our participants, Payton, Kristina, and Blake also had a Q&A with students from the high school. It was great to see the student's excitement about learning more about the college experience.
On Tuesday we returned to Christo Rey to finish the tasks we started the previous day. Once they were completed, we planted a garden and mulched trees and bushes. That evening, Blake cooked us a wonderful Italian dinner, and we sat around a bonfire sharing stories.
Wednesday we went to Urban Ministry Garden. We spent the morning weeding, digging, and carving the Egyptian life symbol in dirt. We finished by noon, and came back to the house we were staying at. Some people studied, but most of us went on a hike in Moss Rock Preserve. It was a beautiful day for a hike. That evening, a few Mizzou alumni took us out to Dreamland Barbeque.
On Thursday we went to Hueytown Middle School serving with the organization YouthServe working with Coach Reed's 7th grade classes. The students chose a issue designed a logo, mission statement, and name for the organization designed to fix the issue. Some of the issues were poverty in Alabama, domestic violence in sports, and drug abuse. After getting locked into Coach Reed's classroom we left and came back to the Carters' home and had dinner. After dinner the group went to Doodles to get ice creme with JuJu the Lynch's daughter. After we returned to the Carters home and watched the Arizona vs. Xavier game and "discussed" the times we would be leaving to go back to Columbia on Saturday. It's sad to discuss our departure as this week is winding down.
-MAB Birmingham
We arrived in Birmingham on Saturday night. We spent the first night meeting our host family, the Lynch's (Tom, Susan, and JuJu). They were all so nice and we loved spending time with them for our first couple of days. Sunday we met up with several Mizzou Alumni at Dave's Pizza. It was really cool seeing so many people turn out and show so much interest in what our group was doing throughout the week. After Dave's Pizza, a Mizzou alum, Nathan Marcus, gave us a tour of Birmingham and gave us a lot of great facts about the history of the city. We got to learn so much about where we were going to be working in the hour and half we spent with him.
Monday was our first day of service at Christo Rey High School. Christo Rey is a school that focuses on preparing students for college that come from low income families that would otherwise most likely not have the opportunity to go to college. Our group was involved in a number of tasks throughout the day, such as repairing desks, decorating the walls of the school, and building a fish tank for the main lobby. In order to complete some of the tasks, we had to purchase things from the store. This would have been no big deal, but we lost about 45 minutes due to Darren taking 4 wrong turns. He wasn't allowed to drive after that.
Three of our participants, Payton, Kristina, and Blake also had a Q&A with students from the high school. It was great to see the student's excitement about learning more about the college experience.
On Tuesday we returned to Christo Rey to finish the tasks we started the previous day. Once they were completed, we planted a garden and mulched trees and bushes. That evening, Blake cooked us a wonderful Italian dinner, and we sat around a bonfire sharing stories.
Wednesday we went to Urban Ministry Garden. We spent the morning weeding, digging, and carving the Egyptian life symbol in dirt. We finished by noon, and came back to the house we were staying at. Some people studied, but most of us went on a hike in Moss Rock Preserve. It was a beautiful day for a hike. That evening, a few Mizzou alumni took us out to Dreamland Barbeque.
On Thursday we went to Hueytown Middle School serving with the organization YouthServe working with Coach Reed's 7th grade classes. The students chose a issue designed a logo, mission statement, and name for the organization designed to fix the issue. Some of the issues were poverty in Alabama, domestic violence in sports, and drug abuse. After getting locked into Coach Reed's classroom we left and came back to the Carters' home and had dinner. After dinner the group went to Doodles to get ice creme with JuJu the Lynch's daughter. After we returned to the Carters home and watched the Arizona vs. Xavier game and "discussed" the times we would be leaving to go back to Columbia on Saturday. It's sad to discuss our departure as this week is winding down.
-MAB Birmingham
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