Most students are well aware of Harding’s emphasis on encouraging people to get out and serve the community, but aside from club service projects and the annual Bisons for Christ service event, it can be difficult to find ways to contribute. In response to this difficulty, the Student Association (SA) and the Student Life Committee are currently working to create a way to inform students of service opportunities through a newly revived program called “Harding in Action.”
Harding in Action is a service the SA plans to provide that will collect service project ideas and match them up with interested students. Dean of Student Life, Zach Neal, said the SA originally started Harding in Action several years ago, but the program eventually evolved into Bisons for Christ and died out.
“Harding in Action was designed to make students aware of opportunities to serve in the community, just as simple as that,” Neal said. “Through the years it fluctuated, depending on the interest of the SA in continuing this. Since I got here in ’06, Harding in Action eventually evolved into Bisons for Christ. While the SA would still try to help with other projects, the name ‘Harding in Action’ faded away for a while and projects weren’t organized the same way they could be and had been in the past.”
Neal said that around that time, the Rock House, a service and college outreach ministry of the College Church of Christ, started organizing service projects, but the projects tend to be more geared towards larger groups and organizations, as opposed to individual students. According to Neal, this year’s SA members were unaware the program existed until they found it buried in the SA handbook.
“Kind of like how King Josiah of the Old Testament unearthed the writings of scripture after they had been lost, it was a little bit like that when the SA realized ‘Whoa, this is in our handbook already, what is this,'” Neal said.
Senior Stephany Ayestas, who serves as the chair of the Student Life Committee, said she felt there was a great need on campus for a program like this and is excited to be leading the way to bringing the program back.
“I read the SA handbook and I’ve always been interested in helping (others), so when I saw that (Harding in Action) was here but wasn’t happening, I asked Philip (Habegger, SA President), and Philip asked Dean Neal if we could do it,” Ayestas said. “We also talked to the student life committee, because not just one person could make this happen, and a lot of people were happy to help.”
Ayestas said Harding in Action hopes to begin sponsoring service projects in mid to late November. Sophomore Truett Keener, a member of the Student Life Committee, said he thinks the program will help students be more aware of the needs around them and get them more involved in Searcy community-life.
“One of our dreams and goals in creating this is to create opportunities for Harding students to serve,” Keener said. “Often we get so involved in school and clubs and all sorts of activities that we don’t have the time to proactively get out in the community to find places to serve. So this will create that opportunity. And one of my own goals with this is to show students that there are opportunities all around us, all the time; there are opportunities to bless people wherever you go.”
