I'm usually not one to post "uplifting" stories here, but this one caught me for some reason. I had to stop and acknowledge what a group of Minnesota students are doing for Spring Break. As alluring as all the MTV and Bacardi and Coors Light and Girls Gone Wild marketing may be, and as nice as it might be to bask in 80-degree sunshine, they said, "You know what? There are more important things I could be doing." This is the kind of story that gives you some reason to believe that this country might end up all right.
They've turned Spring Break into a volunteer center on wheels. Sure, they get to travel around to some places they've never been, but they're also using it as a vehicle to help people who need it. Not trying to convert anyone to their religion, not trying to get publicity, just being there to help because it's needed. Just getting it done. You've got to admire people who back up their talk with action, or just give of themselves without any talk at all. So I've cleared out some diary space to give a Tip of the Hat (certainly not a Wag of the Finger) to these students. They deserve it.
A striking contrast arose for me, because my last encounter with Spring Breaking students was a couple of days ago, when several of them decided to shout obscenities at me from their car for no apparent reason as I rode my bike to work. Now, this group makes them look even more like useless buffoons.
Here's a few excerpts from the story, which appeared in today's Boston Globe:
On spring break, they spread kindness
By Adrienne P. Samuels, [Boston] Globe Staff
March 15, 2006
CAMBRIDGE [, Mass.] -- It had been two days since the college students had taken a shower, and they were filthy.
Covered in dirt and grime from cleaning up a Pennsylvania state park, they eagerly anticipated hot showers at a Cambridge homeless shelter, which they cleaned top to bottom yesterday before boarding a bus to help poor families in New York City.
A whirlwind cross-country volunteering tour is not a typical way to spend spring break, but it is how these 38 University of Minnesota students choose to illustrate the ''Pay It Forward" concept popularized by the 2000 movie in which one good deed led to another.
For one week, instead of tanning on an Acapulco beach in Mexico, the students are picking up trash, scrubbing graffiti, and trying to spread hope -- one act of kindness at a time. [...]
The students boarded a charter bus in Minneapolis at 10 a.m. Friday. Ten hours later, they arrived in South Bend, Ind., to volunteer at a food bank. From there they took the bus to Lancaster, Ohio, to clean graffiti and paint an old covered bridge. Sunday, they arrived in State College, Pa., and the next day they spruced up trails at Black Moshannon State Park.
Monday, they arrived in Cambridge, where they slept in classrooms at University Lutheran Church near Harvard Square. Some of them rode the T for the first time, and during a rare bit of free time, visited the Boston bar made famous by the TV show ''Cheers."
Yesterday, they rose early and cleaned the Harvard Square Homeless Shelter in the church basement, mopping, dusting, and folding clothes. [...]
The students left Boston yesterday afternoon and went to New York, where they planned to help restore apartments for low-income families. Then they go to Washington, D.C., for a joint conference with the seven busloads of about 320 Midwestern students whose pay-it-forward experiences took them on different routes across the country. [...]
Their pay-it-forward college movement was founded by four University of Minnesota students, who started a small tour in 2004 and expanded their organization to several Midwestern colleges and universities. It takes six months to plan each route, according to the group's website. The students raise money and are asked to pay a $425 registration fee to help cover the cost of the charter bus. [...]
Bravo!