One of the sayings at Southwestern Community College is, “Community is our middle name.” The college’s Student Support Services (SSS) program is taking that a step further by participating in community service projects.
Jennifer Ashlock, the Health Sciences Academic Advisor and Tutor Liaison, led the community service programs.
The first project took place in the fall of 2021, and involved students creating 50 hygiene kits for the Vecinos program. Vecinos is a health care organization in Cullowhee that serves farmworkers and low-income adults in western North Carolina. SSS staff also reached out to area businesses and received $350 in donations for the program. The businesses that donated included Food Lion, Walmart, Sav-More, Kelsave, Monkey Toes, City Lights Bookstore, and the SCC Bookstore.
“In the past, we’ve done a lot with the community table. When the pandemic hit and everything shut down, we had to get creative,” said Ashlock. “Once we opened back up, we decided to do things in-house since the students will already be coming to do their check-ins. I already knew about Vecinos, so I called to see what they needed, and we figured we could have the students put together the hygiene kits.”
The other project that students are currently working on involves planting seeds for gardeners to grow at the Cullowhee Community Garden. Lowe’s donated $50 towards the project and the Garden’s manager, Adam Bigelow, provided the soil.
Ashlock added: “It’s a way to allow students to learn about the community, and to educate the community about who we are.”
For more information about Student Support Services, contact program director Dominique Barwatt at d_benson@southwesterncc.edu or 828.339.4408.
For more information about Vecinos, visit www.vecinos.org.
For more information about the Cullowhee Community Garden, visit www.facebook.com/CullowheeCommunityGarden.
