Sara Coe, Gordon E. Crosby, Jr. MBA Candidate and MBA Association VP of Philanthropy, reports on MBA volunteer activities with the United Way.
On September 5, the MBA students at the University of Missouri contributed in the United Way Day of Caring. Our MBA program has the largest amount of volunteers of any program that helps with the Day of Caring, with roughly 30 volunteers. The United Way Day of Caring is an annual event designed to mobilize hundreds of people from the local business community to contribute their time in a day of volunteering at one of many health and human service agencies. Volunteers spend the day performing a number of tasks that cover a wide range of needs.
All the volunteers met at the UM Hearnes Fieldhouse for the United Way Day of Caring Thank-You Breakfast and Campaign Kickoff. They left for their worksites after that, and proceeded with tours and projects.
We had a group of volunteers go to Camp Mudd Children’s Day Camp. There they trimmed limbs, mulched trees and gardens, built benches, and built a challenge course. Volunteers also painted and installed signs, cleaned the lodge and everything inside of it, and repaired screens in the cabins. They worked on clearing trails through the woods. Volunteers cleared several miles where the vegetation had grown into the trail and was obstructing passage. Participants also replaced the markers along these trails that had come out of the ground.
Another group went to the Phoenix House, which offers inpatient and outpatient treatment for addiction. There they helped clean the building, including steam cleaning the furniture, dusting, and sweeping.
Other volunteers spent the day teaching Excel 2007 classes to 16- to 24-year-old at-risk youth at Job Point to help orient them more with a common tool used in businesses.
