Bookmark Your Life!

Date: April 14
COM 304: Conference and Group Leadership 
Group 7

        Bookmark your Life is a fundraiser by Jessica Delaney, Spencer Thibault, Carol Kassas, Courtney Henderson and Caitlyn Coburn. Our goal is to collect donations for books for students that are between the 7th and 12th grade level. Donations are being accepted from all around Albany, from the library, students homes, classrooms and so on. Books can be of any genre as long as they are appropriate reading material. We hope to acquire a broad selection of genres in order to accommodate a variety of preferences. 
       Our goal is to provide these books for students in order to help them learn better habits. If a student can find an interesting book to read, something to help them learn a life lesson or entertain them, then our goal is complete. Sometimes all it takes is one chapter, or one quote to change your life. We want to provide those life changing books. 
       We are striving to help students pick up a book instead of learning bad habits. A book is better then a spray can or some type of crime or illegal drug. Our group has decided to donate books collected to the Lake George High School Library. This school is particularly small and can always use extra books. Located in a small town, this school focuses on reading as a past time so this book drive would benefit the community's needs. 
       The Lake George High School prides itself on community service and donates a lot of time and effort to making a difference. Every year, alumnus Rachel Ray visits the school to talk to the students about bullying. This is to encourage the students to respect other students. We hope to follow this example and lend a hand. This school truly cares about the well-being of their students which is why we want to help their cause by donating reading materials to kids who need an outlet. 
       Once we finish our fundraiser at the end of April and collected the book donations we will deliver them to the High School Library, which is about an hour away from Albany. We are accepting books from all students, campuses or any of those who wish to lend a hand to this great cause. These books are for them to do as they please, whether they'd like to give them out to students to take home or keep in the library for everyone to use. We are just looking to help encourage kids and teenagers to pursue a brighter future.         
       If you would like to contribute to this donation or have any questions or comments, please send an email to, bookmarkyourlifedonations@gmail.com and we can arrange a pickup. Please feel free to share this post in order to spread the word!


#donate #books #library #communityservice #lakegeorge #highschool #rachelray 

Lake George HS Library

Group 3's Great Book Giveaway

Hello! Our names are Joseph Vorbeck, Alicia Smith, Dorian Polk, Pete Schweitzer, and Annelise Campbell and we are Group 3 in Virginia Yonker's 8:45 Conference and Group Leadership class. We are participating in a service learning project called "The Great Book Giveaway" which requires us to donate 26 books to a location of our choice. We are choosing to send them to the Northern Onondaga Public Library in Cicero because we have access to a large variety of books and we feel that we can contribute to the library's current collection. We  personally delivered the books to the library on April 17th. 

http://www.nopl.org/

The Northern Onondaga Public Library seeks to enhance the lives of their members giving them access to a wide variety of books and information. They are committed to maintaining the educational development of the community. They offer many activities for members of the community to participate in including dance classes, Boy and Girl Scouts programs, science programs, and musical performances.

FINAL BLOG POST

We are excited to embark on our mission to promote literacy to all age levels throughout the world. Education and literacy is something many people take for granted or don’t have access to.  We are a student group on campus at the University At Albany enrolled in the Communication 304 Group Leadership course. Our names are (from left to right) Andrea Alarcon, Jen Martin, Maddi Waterbury, Chris Brognano and Chris Barker.

We wanted to find an organization that has a passion to give to those who are less fortunate than we are. We decided that the Salvation Army would be the perfect organization to help us achieve our goals. They have the same vision we have. With the help of the Salvation Army, our group was able to promote literacy by donating numerous books to those in need.

http://www.salvationarmy.org

Giving Back to Athletics (Group 2-B)

          We are the members of group 2-B in the Group Communications class taught by Professor Yonkers at the University at Albany. Our names are Alex, Janice, Myrlande and Pete and for our service project we are giving 20 hours of our time to help the different athletic events that occur on campus.

We decided to work athletic events as our service project because we are all involved in athletics at the university and we would like to give back to show our appreciation to the school for providing us with the chance continue to participate in our sport. One organization we choose to help is the USATF Adirondack Association, the region’s track and field service provider for any meet in the area. Here we worked different areas of a track meet such as raking the jumping pit or timing races while supporting the athletes competing.

                Fan Fest is a school organization that helps bring in students and Albany residents to the Chance to Dance basketball event for the America East Conference and provides them with different activities to participate in. We helped different activity stations run smoothly and allowed spectators to have fun in between games.

                Helping these organizations has allowed us to experience what it is like to be on the other side of an athletic event. It felt nice to give back and help young athletes and spectators have a good time at the different events we worked at and we hope that their experience would want them to compete for the university someday. 

group 4b- Go Green

  Our group, B4, is made up of members Jin Woo, Taylor, Xheni, Amanda and Ilana. For our community service, we collaborated with UAlbany Green Scene, meeting on Mondays and Wednesdays to catch people ‘green handed.’ Our task was to seek out students in the Campus Center and on the academic podium using reusable bags or mugs. We would then approach them and enter them into a raffle to win a Kindle HD.  We would thank them for using environmentally friendly products and encouraged them to keep it up. Our group usually met up with the Green Scene student leaders in front of the 518 Market at 12:30 p.m. We have managed to meet four times during this semester, performing an hour and a half of community service each time.

Our group members shared feelings of practicing good environmentally friendly behaviors, which is why we decided to volunteer our time with the Green Scene. We also liked that the raffle offered an incentive for students to start using reusable items. Because this community service took place on campus, it was accessible for all members and allowed everyone to be present at the same time.

Doing this type of community service as a group has had a great impact on the way we all communicate with each other, but also on the way we set goals on completing specific tasks. Walking around campus talking to random students could get a bit overwhelming, so as a whole we decided to split into two teams, the boys and the girls. We then decided that it would be helpful if we had one specific person, who felt more comfortable approaching random people, to explain the mission of the Green Scene and offer the raffle ticket. The rest of us spoke to the students about the benefits of entering the raffle. Splitting everyone’s tasks was completed with ease because we all have diverse and unique skillsets. We have all learned that it is important to split the work between everyone in the team, and then continually communicate with each other to have the best outcome possible. The Green Scene community service has also given everyone a boost of self-pride because we were helping reinforce positive behavior and giving back to our college community. Finally we have all learned and practiced skills such as organization, leadership and responsibility throughout the course of this project.

Project Inspire - Group B-8

Hello, our group is B-8; the names of our members are Corey Wiley, Hans Hyppolite, Mikey Nau, Everol Taylor, and Brendon Chen. For our class of Group Communication 204, we have been given a project to complete. The service project that our group is involved in includes working with an on campus community organization called Project Inspire. Our community service has included helping local immigrants with learning English, helping to serve food at a local soup kitchen, as well as assisting in the Pine Hills clean up. By April 23rd, each group member will have worked 5 hours each. This will allow us to complete our goal of 25 hours of community service.

One of the organizations that we have been working on with Project Inspire is RISSE, or the Refugee and Immigrant Support Services of Emmaus. This is a local organization that aims to “equip refugees and recent immigrants to build sustainable, independent lives by offering language and literacy instruction, as well as support with life skills and integration into U.S. culture and community.” This is located in Albany at 715 Morris Avenue. We each had the chance to work with someone one on one and help them with learning what would be considered Basic English. We went over simple topics such as the weather, colors, numbers, and even seasons. The people that we got the chance to work with were very grateful and appreciative. One lady even gave the Project Inspire community service chairperson a quick lesson in speaking Muslim. We chose this location because it gave us an opportunity to help and also learn while helping. You can find out more about this organization at their website: http://risse-albany.weebly.com

The next location that we chose to work at is the Capital City Rescue Mission. Unlike a regular soup kitchen, the Capital City Rescue Mission not only feeds those who are in need, but they also spread the word of God while doing it. They are “dedicated to proclaiming the life-changing Gospel of Jesus Christ to the homeless and needy of the capital region, providing for the whole person body, mind, and spirit, that they will return to society maturing in Christ as productive citizens.” This is located in downtown Albany on Pearl Street. We each had a role in serving those who needed it with a hot meal after their church service. After helping with serving the meal, we helped out with the cleanup process. This was a real eye opener, because as college students we tend to take for granted the things that we have. These people were so appreciative for our help and even invited us to return in the future. We chose this, because we wanted to work hands on and directly help those who need it the most. More information can be found out at their website: http://capitalcityrescuemission.com.

Finally, our group assisted with the annual Pine Hills cleanup. This community service opportunity was pretty self-explanatory. We decided to do this as a backup just in case our first 2 opportunities weren’t able to fit everyone’s schedule. The cleanup was not only helpful to the community, but also fun. We got to see other on campus organizations work together for the greater good. All in all, a very rewarding experience.

Therefore, we feel that our work has greatly impacted those that we helped. It was not only an opportunity to help others, but to humble ourselves. When you get so caught up in life you forget that not everyone has it as easy as you do. You then take little things like speaking and eating for granted. This was a really valuable experience and we would be happy to help out again.

Ronald McDonald House

As a group, we decided to use a parallel writing style as our model of writing. Since we are meeting virtually for class today, we split up the sections of our blog and each wrote one. Then, we sent each section to Caila, who is the Editor. She combined all of the sections to complete our assignment. 

Hello! We are group 7- Joanna Egles, Caila Friedman, Angelica Zielinski, Samantha Kraese, and Carly Jenkins. We are proud to say we will be working with the Ronald McDonald house as our part of the community service learning project in our Group Communication class at SUNY Albany. As volunteers spending time at the Ronald McDonald house, we expect to be involved in a number of different tasks with the children and families that are in the house. Some of the fun, yet helpful activities we will be a part of is baking, reading, organizing, etc. Collectively, we will work a total number of 25 hours, which is 5 hours per group member, as volunteers.

Through our groups service involvement with the Ronald McDonald House located in Albany, NY we were able to provide support for the children while also helping the families meet their needs by lending a helping hand. We had the opportunity to be meal partners where we make baked goods for the children in the house. In addition we also we able to be in-house volunteers where we assist in the day- to-day activities of the house such as answering phones and doing light housecleaning work. Our service to the Ronald McDonald house has given our group the chance to better the lives of these children and their families through our combined 25 hours of service in the house. As a group, this service has reminded us how important it is to give back and help our community whenever we can. The impact of our service on the Ronald McDonald house is immeasurable. It was our mission to lend a helping hand to those families and their children and assist them in reaching all their needs. It has been the greatest satisfaction to all of us knowing that we helped them meet those needs.

Our work has impacted our group because it gives us all a sense of accomplishment that we did something good for children who are ill. Our community service work is completely going to children who are ill and in the hospital. Whether we may be helping the Ronald McDonald House for Charity by baking cookies or brownies for children in a hospital, or reading to them, it shows us all that by giving back, we can really help make children feel better and make them a little happier given their situation. We all really enjoy working with this charity for our community service. We really hope that the time we put into this charity was really helpful and beneficial for the charity itself, the people involved in the charity, and the children who are involved in this charity.