Service Learning and Social Change
Project Overview: The main focus of the Ripple Project is to
branch the gap between the Tri-City area and educational institutions
through service learning, by incorporating it into curriculum and
providing local non-profits with an organization geared towards helping
with any projects that meet promote service learning. Ripple's mission
is to promote effective activism through service learning
initiatives that encourage a partnership between campuses and the
community. The Ripple Project was created in 1999 by a
collaborative effort between students and staff of Prescott College in
order to incorporate service learning into the curriculum. It became
part of the Yavapai County VISTA Project in 2006, when former staff,
Heather Houk and the President of the college, Dan Garvey wrote a grant
to Americorps VISTA to get two full time volunteers to take the project
to the next level. The original VISTAs Carmen Stagg and Haley West
focused on building partnerships with the greater community and also
established and built from scratch a community thrift store, Ripple
Repeats Thriftique, to generate continuous revenue for the project and
serve as a resource to fund scholarships for Prescott College students
who are working on service learning projects in the community.
Supporting Organizations: The Ripple Project is based out of Prescott College. PC is a liberal arts college, which is environmentally and service based. This year it was awarded as one of the top 368 colleges in the United States by the Princeton Review because of its dedication to education through its ground breaking projects, such as their work with Kino Bay and the water bird habitat that exists there and the countless other service projects their students engage in with the local people of Prescott and the global community.
Accomplishments
The Ripple Project has helped countless
students and local organizations in their endeavors to promote and help
our community through service learning. We have done this through
projects such as Big For A Day, Cowboy Cook-Off, and the Ripple
Thriftique. Big for a Day, in partnership with Big Brothers Big
Sisters, is a day where youth spend a day in the woods of Prescott
learning outdoor survival skills. At the Ripple Repeats Thriftique
community members donate a wide variety of items which are sold to
generate money for scholarships for projects that give back to the
community or are donated to the needy and other organizations who are
trying to raise money for worthy causes. One such donation project
through Ripple Repeats Thriftique was to support a student group at
Prescott College raising money to open a day laborer center by having a
yard sale. Ripple Repeats donated five boxes and a large trash bag of
clothing and household items to help them raise the funds they needed.
As of May 2008 Ripple has raised over $5,000 through the thrift store
for the scholarship fund.
What's Happening Now
"Right now
at Ripple we are working on establishing a full scale volunteer base
to run the Thriftique in order to be more consistent in the hours that
we are open. Once we have this in place we are creating an action plan
to market the Thriftique, our services and, to also increase the connections
that we have with the local organizations that we serve.
October 1, 2008 the Ripple Project will be hosting the 2nd
annual Connect Your Community Event with the intention of creating
valuable partnerships between non-profits and students. We hope to show
the non-profit organizations the needs and assets of the non-profit
community and we hope to show students the resources and contacts in
working in the community.
We are starting
to plan our Halloween Costume Fashion Show and Auction, which will take
place on Thursday, October 23. There is an all-ages show at 4:30 pm
in the parking lot of Ripple Repeats and the evening show is taking
place at Lyzzard's Lounge that evening between 8-11pm. Volunteer
designers create costumes from items and merchandise in the store within
the theme of Futu-retro (Retro Style meets Future Fashion), to auction
off at the fashion show in order to raise money for the scholarship
fund and the project itself. We are holding fashion
designer/planner/volunteer model meetings every Thursday at 4pm at 312
Grove Ave, the location of Ripple Repeats. We are also inviting community non-profits to have a costume in the show where proceeds will go toward their organization.
Another one of our projects is to start
Ripple Round Table Discussions about prevalent issues, their actual
causes, and solutions to these causes as opposed to bandages to just
aid and cover up the problem. These meaningful conversations will be
starting on September 18 from 6-8 pm; the first discussion will be on
the water issues that we face in Prescott. We are also working very
closely with an Americorps member in designing a youth based project
which is geared towards increasing their involvement in their community,
issues that interest them and activism. Ripple has always had a goal
of generating interests within local high schools for service learning,
by creating volunteer activities that fulfill educational standards
and requirements and are interesting to the students and may increase
their future involvement in service and activism." - Kimberly Miller and Lianne Rydell
For more information or an updated list of our activities please visit our web page:
http://groups.prescott.edu/ripple/
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