Aaron Johnson – General Assignment Reporter
NEW HAVEN – Sunny skies, warm temperature, and a slight breeze made for perfect weather for the Southern Connecticut State University “Big Event.” The Big Event is a campus-wide service initiative in which the different organizations around campus come together to support the New Haven and surrounding communities.
“I had a really great time,” said junior Jose Collado, who cleaned up some of campus with the rest of the Orientation Ambassadors. “It was just really chill and I enjoyed it.”
The premise of The Big Event is that one day a year, Southern students band together to provide some type of service or volunteer in the local community. Across campus different Greek life and other organizations also participated in the volunteering festivities. Junior Natalie DeAndrea said that she not only had a lot of fun, but also she felt good to help out the community.
“We went to a community near campus,” said DeAndrea, a member of Delta Phi Epsilon sorority. “We worked with some of the youth in the community to help build a community garden”
DeAndrea said that the experience was something that she enjoyed, but she does admit to being relieved at the choice of volunteering her sorority was doing.
“Honestly at first I thought we were going to be doing something like picking up garbage,” she said. “But once we got to our site and got started it was really enjoyable.”
DeAndrea said that the experience of helping to grow the community, whether it was cleaning up garbage or building a community garden, the reward was in the act of doing the good deed.
“After we were finished for the day, I felt it was a very rewarding experience and I was honored to be a part of an event that gave back to the community. Especially because the garden we helped create is going to be cared for by the youth program there, ” DeAndrea said.
Although it was his first time participating with the Big Event, Collado said that he felt like it was something that he was proud to be doing.
“It was a chance for us to help out not only the Southern community but also the New Haven community,” he said.
The day was completed with not only helping to build up the several communities students volunteered in, but also to interact with the people living in the community.
“It was a lot of fun all the kids wanted to help out and get involved in whichever way they could,” DeAndrea said. “We spent our time there putting together the base of the garden beds and the fencing around them. After we finished most of the work, I know a couple of sisters were playing duck duck goose with a couple kids as well as having mini races.”
The different organizations that participated signed up prior to the event. It was a long day, but the running around was just another way of making the day fun and entertaining.
“First we were in the quad outside of Chase Hall,” Collado said. “Then we moved into the Farham Hall Programming Space. After we moved from there, a lot of us ended up across the street from
Schwartz Hall and the Student Center so we were running around a little bit.”
The day started for most of the participating clubs and organizations early that morning with many going into the late afternoon and even the evening.
“It was a long day,” Collado. “But I would more than definitely do it again. To be honest, I hope I can participate again next year when Southern does this again. I think it’s something that everyone should try to be apart of at least one time.”
