In May, second-year students from the Chancellor’s Leadership Development Program (CLDP) completed an annual service trip in Ocean City, Maryland. CLDP is a two-year, with an optional third year, program facilitated by the Shelton Leadership Center (SLC). The program engages rural and/or first generation college students in values-based leadership development.
The second-year cohort of students elected to focus their service trip on addressing food insecurity and homelessness in the Ocean City area. They traveled to the coastal town in early May, shortly after the Spring term ended. Throughout the week, the CLDP students spent time volunteering with two local organizations: the Maryland Food Bank Eastern Shore and Diakonia.
“This unique opportunity to travel and engage in meaningful service work is an incredible bonding experience for our second-year students,” said La’Toya Cesar, SLC Assistant Director of College Programs and CLDP Program Director. “During the service trip, students put into practice the values-based leadership skills we’ve been developing throughout the program. It’s inspiring to witness them thrive as leaders and demonstrate compassion through their service work.”
The students are tasked with planning their service trip from start to finish and collaborate as a team throughout the year to select the destination, type of service, and all other logistical details. Students work directly with service organizations to complete their service project and provide support where it is needed most within the community they elect to travel to.
“The main thing I learned on this trip was the impact volunteers have on non-profit organizations, especially the smaller ones. It’s already hard managing an organization a lot of people depend on and then having so many more things to do on top of that can be challenging. As volunteers we can help with that load even if it’s just a couple of hours,” Jackeline Apolonio Campos, a third-year CLDP student, said. “I already knew volunteering was a good thing, but now I know just how impactful it can be. The people we met that led the organizations we volunteered for really had a passion for what they were doing without thinking about their salary and that really resonated with me because I think that’s the goal at the end of the day, doing something you enjoy and helps the community you live in.”
One of the main impacts for the second-year CLDP students was being able to work together on a large-scale project.
“On this trip, I learned how important and impactful it can be when you combine service and relationship building,” Belle Merlo, a second-year CLDP student, said. “When you have a large group such as the [Year 2] cohort, having all of us together as friends working together towards a common goal of serving this community, our impact is able to exponentially grow.”
