Community Services Program

UMD continues effort to aid Katrina victims

September 15, By Katie Bresnahan

On Wednesday, September 14, a discussion was held in the Sunset Room of the Campus Center to talk about what students can do for the Hurricane Katrina relief effort. Present were UMD students interested in knowing how they could help out in aiding the victims of Hurricane Katrina.

When introducing the day’s speaker, Red Cross staff member Winnie Dimock, Deirdre Healy, the Staff Associate for Community Service at the Career Resource Center, explained, “The first thing to do [in a situation like this] is ask the people who know how to help to help.”

During the first portion of the discussion, Dimock told those in attendance that the Red Cross’ purpose is to provide food, clothing and shelter to those in need: “The disaster services at the Red Cross have a primary job to help people recover from disasters.” This department of the Red Cross is called the Disaster Services Human Resources or DSHR.

Dimock also talked about volunteering for the Red Cross. Over 40,000 volunteers have been trained or are training. There were 17 volunteers trained in New Bedford two weekends ago, and a similar number trained last weekend. She said that one requirement for volunteering for Red Cross is that a person must be available for at least two weeks. When people go to New Orleans to help with the relief effort they will be staying in shelters with the hurricane victims, living the same way that they do.

One idea raised at the meeting was that UMass Dartmouth students could volunteer to go down to New Orleans during winter break. If students do volunteer, they will have to go through one day of Red Cross training and an orientation, both of which will likely be held on campus in the coming months. According to Dimock, “Students should go to New Orleans with no expectations.”

During the second portion of the discussion, other ideas were brought up about how UMD students could help out in the hurricane relief effort. Ideas raised included the Adopt a College Program, in order to get the hurricane-damaged colleges and universities up and running again as soon as possible. Also, according to Adrianne Schaefer, the Campus Store will be holding a benefit for the hurricane victims. She says, “Students will have the option of donating a dollar, and we will have a chain around the book store with the names of those who donated. It will be like the Jimmy Fund type of fund raisers that they do at the supermarket.”

Also last week, on Tuesday, September 13, a swipe-a-meal program was held at the UMD Res Caf. Through this program, students involved donated approximately 822 meals. Several volunteers helped out at this event; one of them was Teddy Petsas.

“I know that there are a lot of kids like myself out there that would like to help out but are far away or just can’t think of a good way to do it. By volunteering at the swipe-a-meal and giving students the option of being able to donate a meal instead of cash or time, I feel like I was able to really help the cause. Even though I’m on the opposite side of the country, there are a lot of kids like myself out here that would like to help even a little, but can’t think of a good way to do it,” Petsas explained.

Schaefer went on to say, “We had a swipe-a-meal for the tsunami, but this one did twice as well. It really shows that UMD wants to help. About half of the students at Res donated a meal to the hurricane victims, which is just amazing number."