Alternative Breaks
Join the Movement!
Alternative Breaks are opportunites for students to volunteer domestically, as well as internationally while studying and experiencing social issues facing society today. We offer both Winter and Spring trips and applications for both trips willl be available in the Student Life Center once classes begin.
Small groups of 10-12 students travel to a site to work with a nonprofit organization. These groups, led by trained student Site Leaders, meet weekly prior to the trip to better understand the social issue they will be tackling as well as the culture of the local area. Following the experience, students return to help local non-profits in the Saginaw community who are also dealing with the same social issues.
Alternative Breaks is an alcohol and drug free program. Last year, over 30,000 students participated in Alternative Breaks trips nationwide.
Past Alternative Breaks:
- Students planted 2,000 bald cypress trees in the Louisiana Bayou.
- Four residential wheelchair ramps were built for homes in Nashville, Tennessee.
- Worked with girls suffering from the effects of sexual abuse in Greenville, South Carolina.
- Constucted living structures for cougars, bats and tortoises in Florida.
- Rebuilt houses destroyed by Hurricanes Rita and Katrina in Lake Charles, Louisiana.
- Taught English to orphaned students in Monti Cristi, Dominican Republic.
This Year's Issues:
Winter Break
- Environment
- HIV/AIDS
- Immigration
Spring Break
- At-Risk Youth
- Preservation of the Fine Arts
- Rural Poverty
- Women's Issues
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