Cascade Community Service

Last week during our afternoon activity block, students ventured from campus into the greater Cascade community to conduct a variety of service projects. Our student Leaders of the Week, Mikey, Kate, and Abby, surveyed students about what projects they would be interested in joining and then gave them designated time to build plans. Groups worked with the Cascade Food Pantry, the recycling center, the Cascade Cultural Arts Center and a local daycare.

Each group returned to campus with stories of success. Food pantry shelves were restocked, a daunting snow removal task was easily accomplished with the help of a handful of students, mini Spanish lessons were taught at the cultural center. And, at the local daycare, Alzar School students played freeze dance, tag, and hide and seek, while still making time to draw snowmen and make paper airplanes with a group of adorable tots. Each student brought their passion for activities to the afternoon in order to make it a success.

At the daycare, Hannah and Mikey started the afternoon off with freeze dance, finding a Spotify kids radio station and challenging a couple of three-year-olds to a dance-off. Abby led a snowman drawing activity and helped students shape the noses of their snowmen just right. Harriette patiently helped, providing one of the more shy toddlers with a lap to sit on for the duration of the activity. Barrett and Guillermo, meanwhile, spent their time with the rambunctious boys. After helping to build paper airplanes, they played soccer and tag with the kiddos who were not ready to sit down.

It was great to see the Alzar School students engage in the Cascade community in so many positive ways. They put a lot of time and effort into the afternoon and came away with great stories about the moments they had and the connections they made. Overall, the opportunity gave students the chance to better connect with our local Idaho community and to live up to one of the 10-Elements of Leadership: Community Membership and Service.