Students use fall break to volunteer Three Days of Service

By: Mike Bell

Posted: 10/23/09

For some students, fall break was a time to sleep in and update their Facebook statuses. For others, it was a time to breathe in the cold Northeast Omaha morning air while pounding nails into window frames. UNO students took part in the Three Days of Service project through Habitat for Humanity Omaha on Oct. 17, 19 and 20.

The four new houses on 33rd and Manderson Streets were part of the project's goal of providing housing for low-income families and encouraging involvement within the community.

Between 70 and 80 UNO and local area highschool students volunteered over fall break. They also helped construction efforts in Council Bluffs and refurbished Santa's Children Christmas Village in Macedonia, Iowa. Children who are in struggling families are taken on free trips to see Santa at this village around Christmas.

Since 2003, UNO has helped sponsor similar projects, with the student work negating more than $750,000 in labor costs. UNO senior Erin McNally said the negated costs this year will total more than $1 million over a span of 17 days.

"Whatever they need us to do, we'll do," she said.

Gregory Lavery, a construction supervisor with Habitat for Humanity, said that it would be very difficult to get this amount of work done in such a small amount of time without help from the students.

"What takes us months to do, you folks finish in one week," Lavery said.

The lots on Manderson Street were donated to Habitat by the City of Omaha. Each of the $132,000 houses has five bedrooms, a garage and meet all Energy Star power specifications.

"We're only one of the five builders in Omaha that are that efficient with energy," Lavery said.

Xing Shao, an international studies student from China, smiled and laughed as she climbed up scaffolding to help hammer nails into a windowsill while her friends watched from below.

"It's my first time doing this. I wanted to get some volunteer experience because I want to work at the 2012 Olympics in London," she said. "The weather's not that bad, I'm enjoying it because it's much colder [back home] in China."