Published: December 10, 2009

With the lighting of the Christmas tree in the plaza, the holiday season is undeniably upon us. For some, this means stressful hunting in the concrete jungle for the perfect presents, but it also means giving. Sure you can toss unwanted change into Salvation Army bins, but what if you really want to get involved in the community and help those less fortunate than yourself?

With its office along the hallway leading from the bookstore to McMahon Hall, there is a good chance you pass the Dorothy Day Center for Service and Justice every day. The center, which changed its name this year from the Community Service Project, tries to increase its chances of being noticed with eye-catching signs that underline its purpose: to help students interested in social change find both ongoing and one-time service opportunities, service-learning options, non-profit and public service internships and social justice experiences.

For those who work for the center, the effectiveness comes from one of the major principles they teach people interested in volunteer opportunities: the two feet of social change.

According to Kate Cavanagh, the associate coordinator of community service and service-learning at the Dorothy Day Center of Fordham College at Lincoln Center (FCLC) the two feet of social change is the principle that “direct service and charity work are important but do not address the structural inequalities which create a need for volunteers in the first place.” In addition to service and charity work, the Dorothy Day center believes that students need to know the roots of the problems.

“We encourage students to participate in service-learning or other upcoming Center for Service and Justice (CSJ) events to ground their service work in a larger understanding of the historical and political context of poverty, hunger and homelessness in New York City,” said Cavanagh.

The Dorothy Day Center aims to take the idea of service and justice much farther than volunteer work.

“Most students who visit the office want to help and are looking to be placed at community organizations with a one-time or on-going volunteer opportunity,” said Cavanagh. “We talk to them about our office’s mission to create mutually beneficial relationships between the university and community organizations grounded in our commitment to standing on the two feet of social justice.”

For those who cannot make the commitment to both feet of social change, Cavanagh suggests looking for such one-time volunteer experiences from your student page of my.fordham.edu under Volunteer Opportunities.

A unique offering of the Dorothy Day Center is the service-learning program. Service-learning is meant to test the concepts of students’ courses and allow them to practice the skills of a course through experience in the community by serving an underrepresented or marginalized group. Some examples of classes paired with service are: Understanding the Global Economy with the International Rescue Committee, American Immigration and Ethnic History with Roosevelt Hospital and Modern American Social Movements with Momentum AIDS Project.

As part of the service-learning Program, Russell Dowling, FCLC ’11, volunteers with the Emergency Department at Roosevelt Hospital in connection to his American Immigration and Ethnic History class. “The main reason I decided to volunteer was because of my interest in health care,” said Dowling. “I wanted to be able to explore the issues of American health care and public health first hand. And the experience so far has been great. I’ve had the opportunity to talk to patients about their experiences in the American health care system and formulate some ideas on the immigrant experience of the 21st century.”

The Dorothy Day Center can also be accessed through the Prophets course taught through the theology department by assistant professor of theology and women’s studies Karina Martin Hogan. It is a service-integrated course that requires participation in a volunteer program. Martin Hogan’s goal of the service component of the course is “to identify aspects of our present-day society that relate to the message of the Hebrew Prophets.” Currently students are volunteering at Momentum AIDS Project, Lincoln Square Neighborhood Center and Star Learning Center.

“The students at Momentum are involved in providing wholesome meals and groceries to people living with HIV and AIDS,” Martin Hogan said. “The group at Lincoln Square Neighborhood Center is divided between the daily luncheon for senior citizens and the afterschool program for kids. The group at Star Learning Center all does after-school tutoring for kids of various ages. I’ve found that being involved in service has made the messages of the prophets seem very relevant to the students’ own experiences.”

Anyone with interest in service opportunities can find more information on the Dorothy Day Center for Service and Justice on their page through Fordham.edu, by sending an e-mail to [email protected] or by dropping by the office on the lower level of Lowenstein.

Want to get involved?

Here are a few volunteer opportunities you can find through the Dorothy Day Center.

• Momentum AIDS Project: One of the most popular service opportunities, Momentum, offers communal meals and carryout bags for people infected with HIV every Wednesday. St. Paul the Apostle Church across the street hosts volunteers for lunch and dinner who want to help prepare the food, distribute it to the visitors and clean up. Afterwards, volunteers eat with the Momentum clients, offering an opportunity to converse with members of the community. Momentum also hosts breakfast in the South Bronx on Saturdays.
• Lincoln Square Neighborhood Center: Students help with Lincoln Square’s Daycare Program and School Age Program, which mainly serves the residents of the Amsterdam Houses to our West. Students help in the classroom and tutor in reading, math, writing and social studies through their Youth Empowered to Proceed Program.
• International Rescue Committee: Volunteers can work a number of roles as part of the International Rescue Committee, from tutoring refugee children in English and helping refugees write resumes and prepare for job interviews they help set up, to assisting IRC staffers with orienting refugees to their new cultures and picking up donated goods and delivering them to homes of new refugees.