Corrections Club Making a Difference!

Guess what our Corrections Club was up to last week! Criminal Justice/Corrections Club students gave their time and energy to Service-Learning and engaged in a project with Habitat for Humanity in Washington/Dodge County.

Corrections Club President, Jessica Parsons, has passion, enthusiasm and a sincere desire to become actively involved in the community through Service-Learning projects and has passed this passion on to other club members to become engaged in the process.

It began at a meeting when Jessica proposed the club focus should be on giving back to the community.  Students in the program/club identified poverty, homelessness, hunger, MH and AODA issues as some of the contributing factors affecting individuals and correlation among/within the CJ system.  In an effort to increase awareness and empathy among club members, it was decided the club would be part of the solution and get involved!

Club members and advisor met at a Habitat home in Washington County and assisted with mudding drywall, taping windows/doors to prep for painting, texture walls using a hopper and another student would complete the knock down of the texture. Two other students assisted with the breakdown of scaffolding at the other Habitat site (MPTC students in another program are currently building a duplex in Washington Co).

Photo: Joseph Clark, Peter Giove, Matthew Henning, Steve Smith, Jessica Parsons and Joan Barfield (Connections Science Instructor at MPTC).

Near lunchtime, the soon to be owner of the house arrived and the students had the opportunity to meet her and learn that she would be moving in with her four children. Currently, they are living in a homeless shelter.

Interestingly, many of the club members who helped with the house, were students in one or more of Brenda Schaefer’s classes and had the opportunity to engage in service-learning projects previously.

This is proof that service-learning is so meaningful to our students that they would love to help out again. Providing "service" and "learning" can create an impact in the lives of all members of a community.