When I was in high school, I always enjoyed volunteering. I would tutor, work at my local cat shelter, and help with my school’s garden. When I got to college, I knew I wanted to continue volunteering and tried to look for opportunities. I participated in the Fall Spartan Day of Service, where I learned about an organization called Alternative Spartan Breaks, or ASB. This club goes on volunteering trips, or “experiences.” Students can choose from multiple weekend experiences per semester and week-long experiences during winter and spring breaks. After the event, I was instantly intrigued.
To register for an experience, you have to do a short application.
The experiences are named after the social issues that the volunteering will address. For instance, it may be named “Environment” or “Domestic Violence.” Students apply based on what social issue they are most passionate about, not the location of the experience. I applied for the “Fighting Poverty” weekend experience and heard back from the club within about a week that I was approved. I then filled out more information about pickup and background checks and paid the $50 fee that covered transportation, room and board, and a shirt. Week-long experiences cost $400, but partial or full scholarships may be available.
The location for the experience is kept under wraps until pretty soon before. As someone that needs a solid plan well in advance, that was rough for me, but it worked out. The location we were volunteering at was Cass Community Social Services in Detroit, MI. I was put in contact with the rest of the group, and then I had to wait until the weekend of the experience.
Unless the experience is international, transportation is covered by student drivers. The application asks whether you have a license and are willing to drive. It also asks where each participant lives. Based on this information, we were sorted into car groups. For weekend experiences, you will leave for the location early Saturday morning (7:00am for us) and return early Sunday afternoon. The early wake-up made it so everyone in the car was pretty tired, but we were able to start getting to know each other anyway. Luckily, the driver communicated with everyone effectively, so we knew the pickup plan pretty well.
After picking every group member up and an hour-and-a-half drive, we arrived in Detroit. The site had multiple buildings, so we headed to the warehouse first. For weekend experiences, the entire group volunteers together in three-hour shifts. In total, we did nine hours of work over two days. Our first shift was helping to shred documents, which was something I did not expect; the itinerary said we would be doing warehouse work, but not specifically what it would be. We had to sort through confidential documents and separate them into white paper and mixed paper, as they get recycled differently. We then took turns carefully loading the paper into the biggest industrial shredder I have ever seen in my life. The shredded paper will later be recycled. This work overall was not very difficult, so the group was very conversational. It was noon before we knew it, and the shift was over.
Between each shift, we had meals at the kitchen in the shelter. Some of us felt unsure about the fairness of us eating the food that goes to residents, but part of our fee paid for our food and there seemed to be plenty to go around; we were offered seconds at lunch! It was a great experience to eat among the residents and get to know them. It also helped immerse us into the space that we were giving service to and provided perspective on our lives at home and at college.
After lunch, we headed back to the warehouse to do yard work around the property. Something I noticed during this experience was that I didn’t really consider all the work that goes into maintaining a shelter and social services complex. I knew we were going to do kitchen work on Sunday, but I was surprised that shredding documents and yard work were our other two jobs. It makes sense, since someone has to do them and the shelter may not otherwise have the staffing to get jobs like that done when they have to focus on residents. I was glad we were able to provide the group needed to tackle the jobs.
The yard work was exhausting. Lawnmowers and shovels in hand, we went to multiple locations around the Cass Community Social Services property to cut grass and pull weeds. We dug into cracks in the sidewalk and tried our best to level the grass. It was exhausting work, and by the end of the three hours, morale and energy was getting low. However, the location needed the cleaning and felt a lot more lively after. We were even able to mow a dog park, which can hopefully be used again.
Once we were done with this shift at 4pm, we had free time. Our housing for the night was about ten minutes down a highway inside of a church in Downtown Detroit. There were cots set up in the basement for everyone. Communal sleeping arrangements are common on ASB experiences, so bringing a pillow and a blanket/sleeping bag is recommended. There were also bathrooms and showers in the building. We had a discussion to reflect on the day’s events and what we learned, then returned to the volunteering site for dinner. Once we ate and drove back to the church, we were able to do what we wanted. A lot of people were pretty exhausted and wanted to relax for a while. We never went anywhere alone and were advised against traveling far. Later in the evening, I played UNO with a group and was able to get to know them that way. It was nice to have free time after a long day.
After going to bed fairly early, we woke up Sunday to get back to the center around 8:15am. After breakfast (which contained an amazing banana French toast bake), we went to work in the kitchen at 9am. It was a lot to have 15 people in one kitchen, so a few left to clean the dining room. I eventually traded off with someone there, so that is what I did for about half the time. Other people in the kitchen helped to cook lunch for the residents. After the dining room was swept and mopped, the two of us headed back to the kitchen and started to pack bagged lunches for residents to pick up throughout the week. This was definitely my favorite job out of all of them, because I felt that I was making a tangible difference to specific people. While all the jobs we did were necessary and important, not a lot of them dealt directly with residents. I enjoyed packing the lunches that I knew would go right to members of the community. We did not stay for lunch after the final shift was over, instead heading back to campus around noon in our car groups.
Overall, the experience was a lot of action packed into one weekend, even more than I expected signing up. I did not always feel like I knew the plan, but that is okay. My biggest advice for those going on an ASB experience is to prepare for a little chaos, because nothing in life will go exactly like what you envision in your head. Saying this, I would highly recommend going on an experience if you are interested. I also advise anyone attending an experience to talk to your peers! Having meals with groups and playing card games after made it a lot easier to go on a service experience with 14 strangers. In addition, it is so important to talk to the people you are helping; the conversations I had taught me a lot, from talking to kids to getting classic mom advice from the head of the kitchen. One final thing: pack light. It will help when everyone is crammed into the car and driving to the location.
ASB was an extremely rewarding experience to be a part of, even with its challenges and exhaustion; I am definitely planning to do one again. As the group took one final picture outside the building, a resident that was sitting on the porch asked to be in it. We all moved so she could be seen in the picture, and she was so joyful. The laughter and connection we all felt from that interaction was exactly why I clicked on the link to apply in the first place: to help the community while meeting other people passionate about service. It made everything totally worth it.