With the holidays finally here it is important to remember what they really are for: giving. Although we love receiving presents from our friends and families, that can often lead us to forget that there are many families out there who struggle during this, and every other, holiday season. There are many ways in which we can help though! One way, which was brought to light on Wednesday, December 3rd by Mrs. Mann via morning announcements, is to volunteer at your local hospital. In her announcement, she said that there will be a group of students going to St. Francis Hospital, a hospital just a few blocks from Padua, that will help during two events this month. There are always food banks, your home parish, or homeless shelters as well. One great way to hear about these opportunities is on UGive.

UGive is a non-profit website in which all Padua students are connected to. UGive’s mission is to “excite and empower the next generation of volunteers.” On the website, one can find local volunteer opportunities that interest them. Because all Padua students have accounts on UGive, some also post about upcoming events that anyone could help with. For more information visit: https://www.ugive.org/.

Although UGive is great for events near Padua, some students live far from Wilmington. Mrs. Alinda, a Padua alumna, science teacher of five years, and service head of three years, had many great ideas for those who don’t know where to serve or what to do because of that. She said, “There are a couple places that are kind of ‘go-to’s. You can always go to a church, you can always go to a food bank, you could always go to like a soup kitchen or a homeless shelter. But, the other thing is, if there are people who are really looking for things, we have a record of the service of the last three years through UGive. So if somebody says ‘I really want to do something in Jersey,’ I can find out somebody else who lived in Jersey and see what they’re doing.”

Mrs. Alinda, as previously mentioned, is the head of service at Padua. When she attended Padua, she wasn’t super involved with service. She did her hours and helped out a bit, but as she said when I spoke to her, “[the students’] schedules are so crazy, and [the student’s schedules] tend to be like “you have free time at 9 o’clock at night when you finished everything, when most organizations aren’t open anymore.” The key thing to helping out is planning ahead. Planning to wrap presents for your parish, planning to feed christmas dinner to the homeless, and planning to donate toys to a Christmas donation are the only ways you will be able to have school time, down time, and service time during this holiday season.  Service isn’t just about working to get hours filled in, it’s about helping out those less fortunate because it is the right thing to do, and “responding to Christ’s call to be a Christian,” as Mrs. Alinda put it.