Maine-ly Marvelous

My first year at USI, I went to a conference in November and found out about a service-learning program in which the Ohio State offered their students opportunities to make an impact by working on local, state, national, and global community service events. It was a great idea and one of my colleagues attended the program with me and said he was going to start something like the OSU program at USI. I told him I would be interested in helping and waited for two years while he never followed through with any of his plans (not really a big surprise - he was a major slacker).

During the summer, we hired a new guy and I was telling him about how I wanted to see a community service program started at USI. He said his passion was service-learning and said he was going to start up something at USI. Of course, I didn't hold my breath but told him I would be interested in helping him.

You may be wondering why I just didn't start the program myself - I was and still am too busy that I knew I could not take the lead on this type of massive program planning. I am taking a full load of classes, working on revamping the student government for our Housing students (yes, a flash back to my Northridge days - I like to restructure - what else can I say?!), and preparing for a job search in addition to my regular work responsibilities.

The colleague actually followed through, wrote the proposals, talked to the people we needed to get permission from, and actually made it so we could take a group of students (no more than 8) to Maine for a week. I handled the advertisement and crossed my fingers that we would get students to go (they have to pay $150 so some could not afford it) and that my CIS professor would allow me to take the midterm early.

Last week, when I got a pedicure, the polish I chose was Maine-ly Marvelous. It is a dark purple - not typically the color I would choose but it was a good luck kind of thing - had to use the polish. It worked! While we have one more day for students to complete applications, we have 4 students that are definitely going and one more who will know for sure tomorrow. On Wednesday, my professor said I can take the midterm next week (which means I have to study like crazy this weekend to be ready!).

We are leaving on Friday, October 7th at 3pm. It's about a 24 hour drive. We will be working at Acadia National Park in Bar Harbor, Maine helping the park build trails and prepare for shut down over the winter months. I cannot wait! The leaves should be changing colors by now so I plan to take a million pics (I will post some here when we return).