Learn Together. Serve Together. Grow Together.
In October, Collegiate scholars, faculty, and staff left the classroom for a day to serve all over the city of Memphis for Collegiate’s third annual Day of Service. Each year, the Collegiate community volunteers at places like New Hope Christian Academy, The Heights CDC, the Second Baptist Pumpkin Patch, and other organizations and areas in the community. The CSM Day of Service is intended to expose scholars to God’s work in the city of Memphis and give each scholar an opportunity to participate in that work. Our desire is for God to bring the Collegiate community closer together through this service experience, and for our scholars to develop a life-long love of serving others.
One of our seniors, Precious, completed her final CSM Day of Service and reflected on this experience and her appreciation for serving others. Her reflection is below.
“For my Day of Service project, my community group went to the Lichterman Nature Center. There we were told that we had to pick weeds. I did not want to do something that boring. I also did not feel like getting dirty. I wanted to plant flowers or clean the community. Anything would have been better than that. When we arrived, I learned that the reason why we were picking weeds was because the weeds’ seeds would travel, and they would possibly land in the flowers around them. The flowers were going to be sold next year, and they wanted to protect them from catching the seeds in them.
That is when I started to realize my purpose for this project. I learned that the flowers need our help in order to be protected from the weeds. This specific project taught me that I have to get out of my comfort zone and do things that will not just better me, but everything around me.
Everything that you do in life will not be comfortable for you, but you just have to find where you fit in and make it to the end. Sometimes when you help a good cause, the end result will be even stronger than what it would have been without you. I also learned that you should go into everything with a positive mindset. You will not know everything in life. If you go into a situation with a negative mindset, you will make the job worse on you. Keeping your head up and smiling will make a light shine brighter on you, and God will bring a bigger blessing for you.
Serving my community brings a huge smile to my face. No matter what or where it is, I am going to give it my all. I want to bring other people joy in a time that we need it the most. Serving has done just that for me over the years, and I plan on continuing doing that while I am in college, even if my school doesn't require it."
Precious and 363 of her peers served for a collective 910 hours in October. Our hope is that our scholars and the city of Memphis are transformed by a heart of service for others and a shared commitment to Grow Together.