by Raechel Fittante
Staff Writer
“Get A Taste of the Good Life” is the theme for the Spring Break Alternative Activity Service Project that will involve a six-day expedition to Mexico beginning April 8.
The project is open to all University of La Verne students who wish to participate in a group work effort to improve the physical living conditions of a boys’ orphanage located in Tecate, a town just outside of Tijuana.
Sponsored by Campus Ministry and the Prevention Center, 15-20 ULV students and staff members will have the opportunity to work at the Orfanato de la Nazarena, which houses a large group of young boys in Mexico who have no homes to live in or families to care for them.
The group, which will be led and coordinated by Tracy Germann, Prevention Center coordinator, and Jane Kirchner, Catholic campus minister, will depart for Mexico on Saturday, April 8, and spend three days repairing roofs, cleaning, painting, and planting grass and trees at the site of the old orphanage.
“It’s a six day trip. We will be stopping overnight in San Diego in order to spend part of the day at the beach for a period of reflection of our own lives before we drive into Mexico,” Kirchner said. “There will be a church service on Sunday and then three days of service and work at the actual orphanage.”
The group will also stop in San Diego on the way home to attend church and share with one another what was learned or achieved from the work and experience.
“We will be making time to reflect,” said Kirchner. “It is important.”
The group will be bringing its own equipment and food for the entire trip, and Campus Ministry will be accepting donations to use or disperse among the people in Tecate.
“We will accept any kind of clothing or tools—anything people want to get rid of,” Kirchner said.
“I would like for some people who speak Spanish to consider going because it helps in the country and with the people,” said Germann.
The group will arrive home on Thursday, April 13, to allow the volunteers to spend time with their own families and friends before Easter.
As an alternative to the typical spring break partying, which can include extensive drinking, the trip instead focuses on the spirit of aid and the spreading of goodwill to underdeveloped, poverty-stricken or economically distressed areas of Baja California.
“Spring Break is usually a high time for parties and high consumption of alcohol. Not everyone wants to do that,” Germann said. “The trip is an appealing alternative and an incredible chance to do something good.”
Kirchner said, “The hard work is difficult, but it is also fun. It’s rewarding getting to meet the children of the village. It’s not the partying kind of fun—it’s just fun.”
The boys of the Catholic-operated orphanage will not be present during the ULV students’ visit. They are sent to stay with other families twice a year—the weeks of Christmas and Easter. This is done in order to instill a sense of family in the orphans during these religious holidays.
“The sisters leave the orphanage [for Easter] also. It’s a perfect time for us to take over and fix it up,” said Germann, who explained that the ULV volunteers will be staying overnight in the orphanage.
The Tijuana trip, originally called the TJ Connection, was started four years ago by Sister Judy Rinek, former member of the Campus Ministry. Volunteers from ULV have participated in annual trips to orphanages in Tijuana every November for one-day expeditions to entertain children since the beginning of the TJ Connection. Due to insufficient funding, the organization’s budget ran out and the 1994 trip was postponed until spring break 1995.
Now, paid for by combined funds from Campus Ministry, the Prevention Center and Student Affairs, the program has changed and expanded. It is free for every volunteer involved. Volunteers may now broaden their experiences by being able to spend more time in Mexico, and make solid improvements in the actual restoration of the orphanage in Tecate.
“We ended up calling the Church of the Brethren in San Diego because we needed to find an orphanage that we could go to in the spring,” said Kirchner. “They referred us to a group we are now going through called Aid for Baja California.”
The correspondent group, Aid for Baja California, is located just outside of Los Angeles and helped ULV by following up and visiting orphanages in Mexico that the school had made connections with as possible places in need of aid.
Sign up sheets for interested persons are available in the Chapel and the Prevention Center. Germann and Kirchner will hold informational meetings in Davenport’s West Dining Hall on Tuesday, March 28, at noon, and Thursday, March 30, at 5 p.m.
Students and faculty are encouraged to attend one of the meetings to obtain the details of the trip and the entire scope of the experience. Sign up sheets and waiver forms will also be distributed.
