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Havelda named Volunteer of the Month
RELEASED: Dec. 8, 2005
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| Kevin Havelda |
DANVILLE, KY -- Kevin Havelda, a sophomore from Owensboro, Ky., has been chosen Volunteer of the Month for November.
Kevin is involved in a number of volunteer projects, both on campus and off. Patrick Noltemeyer, director of volunteer services, praises Kevin's efforts.
"Kevin spends a portion of each week working with our local Salvation Army to provide families and individuals in our community with food, commodities, and services, and, above all, hope. As part of his responsibilities with the CARE organization, Kevin has been instrumental in planning and implementing many of the events for this year's Poverty and Homelessness Week. He organized a group of students to serve at the localsoup kitchen, and helped promote and plan the OxFam Hunger Banquet, the OxFam fast and a campus-wide convocation."
Kevin's involvement with the Bonner Leaders and Poverty and Homelessness Week is rooted in a service trip that changed his perspectives forever.
"The team was in Atlanta, and it had been a long day of service. We were all hungry and tired. We stopped in the city, and I hopped out of the van to ask a man for directions to any restaurants nearby. The man, named Antoine, led me to a McDonald's, where I bought him a meal with the last $5 I had to my name. When I left him (not knowing where or when his next meal would be) we decided to go to Waffle House to eat as a team. I stayed outside, intentionally but discreetly, and decided not to eat that night. I wanted to know what all the Antoines of the world felt like every night. I joined Bonner because it allowed me an avenue to help better their situation. It allowed me a chance to pay back the invaluable lesson of compassion that Antoine had instilled in me. After my encounter with Antoine, I decided to become educated on the poverty condition in our nation.
"I learned some startling facts such as: 35.9 million people live below the national poverty line in this country. That's 12.7 percent of our entire population, including 12.9 million children. A child born this minute has a 1 in 5 chance of being born into poverty. A person making $20,000 a year is considered 'comfortable.' If anything else, people could put faces with those numbers after the Faces of Homelessness convocation and the Oxfam Hunger Banquet."
The volunteer award program at Centre recognizes some of the many students who provide service to the local community. Each year, around 60 percent of all Centre students become community volunteers. The College encourages volunteer service with a community-service day each year as part of the orientation for first-year Centre students. For more information, contact Patrick Noltemeyer at (859) 238-5479 or e-mail noltemey@centre.edu.
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Founded in 1819, Centre College is ranked among the U.S. News top 50 national liberal arts colleges. Centre alumni, known for their nation-leading loyalty in annual financial support, include two U.S. vice presidents and two Supreme Court justices. For more, visit http://www.centre.edu/web/elevatorspeech/
For news archives go to http://www.centre.edu/web/news/newsarchive.html.
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