FOR A WHILE now, Granger has had students give a helping hand to the community to help get credit and new experiences or just to see the Granger community thrive. The program “Volunteer for Good” is one of the ways students help out and gain themselves some credit; but how is this program and the students apart of it doing so far or how and what has this helped them with besides credits? Or how has the programs progress so far will affect it’s future plans on gaining more student participation?

Well after talking to the counseller in charge of the program Mrs.Candia. “Volunteer is doing good thanks to it’s advisors who have been helping students and students who have been logging their hours.” she said. Mrs. Candia had also stated that she heard that students who logged hours have had gained good experience, as well as that the students enjoy their accomplishments as they had done some good. Mrs.Candia said “So far we have had about 59% of the student body log their hours in Volunteer for Good and we are about 21% away from reaching our goal of 80%”. She had stated that there are plans of gaining more student participation as well as that the program will always be open for students to try. Mrs.Candia also shared “I’ve heard talks about if we can’t reach our goal we may lose the program, which is sad because this program offers lots of opportunities to students. Whether to wear the medallion on graduation, or gaining more and new experiences.”.

After interviewing Andi Atencio 12 about their progress with Volunteering and what they have been working on so far they had stated that the LAT have been currently working on “Sub 4 Santa” which consists of acts such as raising money for the cause and packing and wrapping gifts for students who need the help with the holidays this year. “I think  that I made a lot of new friends and learned a lot of new things that I would not have learned not volunteering and I like it.” Atencio said. When asked about any challenges or difficulties with volunteering Atencio said “Yeah, just because everything comes with challenges, everything is going to be difficult if it’s good, there are always going to be some problems with Volunteer For Good and volunteering in general.”.

The Volunteer for Good program is one that Chantello/Oliver Mosuela 12 says has helped them become more open to asking people if they need help. “I think being able to step into the idea that I can do things by just being present that gives me the confidence to ask “Hey how can I help?” and just helped me with communication like that and confidence.”. Mosuela also states that their idea of volunteer work changed as of before volunteering. “Before hand I thought volunteer work was something you had to do a lot more to get into it. So I had thought find specific communities to join and I had to do this big search to do actual volunteer work. But once I started Volunteer for Good through joining the LAT class I learned that really you can do volunteer work wherever you go and it can be something as small like “ Hey can I mow your lawn for you?” or it could be something big like the Medallion Project, service is easy it’s not something that you search for its something you can give when you can.”. Mosuela also states that losing the Volunteer for Good program would be a sad loss. As it would mean losing a big and helpful resource for students.