One Kauai student is helping others connect with the community through volunteer service.
Island School senior Emily Sullivan organized a community service fair Tuesday. About 180 students from Island School, Kauai High School and Hawaii Technology Academy attended the fair at Wilcox Gym.
“Kauai’s a really special place, especially in the sense that we have all these organizations and we have all these things that really need protection,” Sullivan said. “There’s so many groups that need volunteering, and the more we can get involved the better it is.”
Sullivan contacted volunteer organizations to set up displays and tables to educate students from all over the island about volunteer opportunities. Sixteen organizations displayed exhibits and answered students’ questions, including Lihue Public Library, Koke‘e Resource Conservation Program and Waipa Foundation.
The event was part of her service project for the National Honor Society.
“We’re just looking for some way to help,” said Island School sophomore Lapis Dove. “We’re really into nature and that kind of stuff, so it’s really exciting to be able to find an opportunity of community service that would interest us, so we could have a little fun with it.”
“Our students have a community service obligation and they don’t know where to go or what to do,” said Catherine Barele, Island School teacher and National Honor Society adviser.
“I’m hoping to reach out to students who don’t always get to visit the North Shore,” said Waipa Foundation’s Kaui Fu. “Sometimes it’s hard for the students to field trip out to Waipa because the bigger buses don’t get to go over the little one-lane bridges.”
Fu wants to promote growing and eating local by providing students opportunities to volunteer for Waipa’s Community Workday every fourth Saturday of the month from 9 a.m. to noon with lunch.
Sullivan has had some good experiences with community service, especially the Kauai Forest Bird Recovery Project. Over the summer she went to Alakai Swamp with them and was able to hold some native Hawaiian birds.
“For me that was really, really important because I want to go on and study molecular biology and work with conservation,” she said.
Wailua’s Stephen Jensen, Hawaii Technolgy Academy sophomore, was interested in learning more about volunteer opportunities to help with beach cleanup, coral protection, library programs and paddling outreach.
“I’m just here to explore what kind of organizations are out there,” Jensen said.
“I’m trying to learn new things and find cool stuff to do to help out the
community.”
Student Kyle Voss signed up to volunteer with several organizations.
“There’s still a lot of good people here who can help try to make it better,” he said. “I like to help out. It’s a small difference but still good.”
Voss and classmate Connor Hall signed up to help protect Kauai’s coral reefs as well as farming at Waipa Foundation and neutering with the Humane Society.
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John Steinhorst, staff writer and photographer, reports on local business, music, education and events. He can be reached at (808) 245-0445 or jsteinhorst@thegardenisland.com.
