March 11, 2008

Students volunteer to work on hurricane relief project over their spring break

Approximately 20 Morningside College students are forgoing traditional spring break activities in order to travel to Louisiana to help repair and reconstruct homes still damaged from 2005’s Hurricane Katrina.

Led by the Rev. Kathy Olson, Morningside chaplain and director of church relations, the student group will leave the college campus after classes on March 14 and drive to Metairie, La., which is located adjacent to New Orleans.  The students will work through the Volunteers in Mission program of the United Methodist Committee on Relief to repair or rebuild homes in the New Orleans area. The student group plans to be back in Sioux City on March 22.

“Several Morningside students taking part in this trip to Metairie have participated in other hurricane relief efforts,” Olson said. “I think it’s to their credit that our students take time from their spring break – when they could be spending time with family and friends – to help residents of areas still struggling to recover from the effects of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.”

This is the fourth relief trip that Morningside students and staff have made to hurricane-damaged areas along the Gulf Coast. In the spring of 2006, a Morningside group helped with cleanup and reconstruction efforts in Picayune, Miss., which was devastated by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. That trip was followed by other mission efforts in Lake Charles, La., during the spring of 2007 and in Beaumont, Texas, during Christmas 2007.