Time flies in just a blink of an eye! Bears finished their last regular meeting for this semester on the past Wednesday. We were also having an awesome potluck in our “Ugly Christmas Sweaters.” I spent my last few breaks doing volunteer work with Bear Breaks and learned lots of valuable lessons through every immersion trip. Volunteering is demanding to some degree, it makes me feel fulfilled though. As the only one international student among trip leaders, I feel grateful, honored and proud to be involved in. Thanks for caring, sharing and growing together! 🙂

Throw back to the first time when I applied for the immersion trip to Kansas City, I was extremely passionate about helping people in need and giving back to the community. We made good connections with the children, families and alumni there, which stimulated me to explore the big picture of the social issue. Thus, I keep moving and spent all of my Spring Break time to devote myself to serve the community. In fact, I don’t think we could eliminate one social issue by volunteering just several times. But volunteering changes the human mind indeed. When you see the problems of other people, you become wise and sympathetic. This activity changes your worldview, material and spiritual values. You get to know about the structure of our society and its inequality. Moreover, you learn about the problems and challenges, which affect the life of the majority of the people. At the same time, you broaden your horizons when you travel around your home country and visit other countries in different parts of Earth.

When I looked through the applications, I was surprised and excited to find out that there were many great participants with enthusiasm had applied for the coming Colorado Spring Break trip. Their expectations impressed me a lot. I’m so delighted to lead this trip which will be focusing on “Children’s Health in Color: Using Therapeutic Play to Engage with At-Risk Youth,” because I love children and have interest in therapeutic play. In terms of therapeutic play, it allows the child to express and process difficult emotions in the child’s most natural form of self-expression, play. Through the supported play in a safe space with the therapist, children can express and integrate emotional stresses and traumatic experiences. As these experiences are processed and worked through in the therapeutic setting, children gain a sense of empowerment and obtain the tools to cope with future stresses that may arise. I am making a detailed ETO plan and doing some research for this trip. I’m sure this rewarding trip will make a big impact on our heart and lives.

Last but not the least, making good use of your time because it is critical to a successful volunteering venture. I read an article about the time management a few days ago, and I want to share some points with you. We already have lots of demands of our time, work or school duties, exam preparation, families and now you want us to add another scoop to our heaping plates! For many of us, especially those in the working world, it seems as if there is no time to add a volunteer experience to our schedules. But if you budget your time well, you will find that you can set aside plenty of time for it without compromising your ability to satisfy your other obligations. If you can pull it off, you will find the experience of serving others to be most rewarding!