Planning Spring Break - Not such a walk in the park.

Freshman year when I joined Habitat, there was one Spring Break Trip for Habitat; North Carolina. Every year, they would send about 15 students down to build an entire house in a week. SHU Habitat was not very strong when my friend Kaitlin and I took it over. It had about ten general members that attended meetings each week, and an executive board that was great but didn't exactly bring a lot of new ideas to the table. It was sophomore year when Kaitlin and I really started to break ground on the NEW SHU Habitat. We had a great executive board with new ideas flowing everywhere. We really put ourselves on the map by advertising what we do, posting pictures, getting published in the Spectrum, and hosting events that brought a lot of attention to us and what we do. Soon enough, we had over 50 general members at the meetings each week and more people interested in Spring Break than we had spots for. Little by little, we increased the number of participants we sent on Spring Break, then increased the amount of trips we took over Spring Break. Now, here we are planning four different Spring Break trips in the same week. This year we're sending 75 students to Mississippi, Texas, Arizona, and of course, North Carolina. Since we only charge a fraction of what it actually costs to send the student down there and our budget is less than adequate, we have to fundraise the rest ourselves. We're talking thousands and thousands of dollars given were we've ended up due to our strong ambissions. But we do it. The expense forms to fill out for cash advances, the insurance waivers, legal waivers, drug contracts, sorting money, sending thank you's to donors, organizing the fundraising events, advertising for every event, oh and then still building the houses in Bridgeport every weekend. It's all worth it though. Especially when you get to experience one of the house dedications and the tears come to the eyes of the family that's getting stability in their lives for the first time in a while.