February 16, 2010
STAFF WRITER
A report issued in July by the Corporation for National and Community Service found that, even in the grip of prolonged economic recession, volunteers were hard at work. Almost 62 million Americans volunteered 8 million hours through an organization in 2008, up 1 million from the previous year.
Their continuing efforts, reckoned to be worth $162 billion in 2008, are “fueled by a compassion boom led by young adults and a wave of do-it-yourself volunteers working with their neighbors to fix problems,” according to the report.
Echoes of that compassion boom are resounding in the area; they include the work of some Trenton Central High School students and a program at the Hamilton Library.
The students, who belong to the Science Mentors One-to-One program at the school, have been helping with food drives at area supermarkets organized by Yes We CAN!, a group dedicated to alleviating hunger in Mercer County. Along with other volunteers, the young people stand outside area supermarkets twice a month and ask customers for food donations to help stock the shelves of the Crisis Ministry food pantries. In turn, the pantries in Trenton and the Nassau Presbyterian Church in Princeton supply about 85 Mercer County families with food each day.
The students got to see that part of the equation during a recent visit to the Trenton pantry on East Hanover Street as they helped those in need pack their shopping carts and bag the groceries. “It just feels good knowing that you can help out, that you can make a difference,” junior Jackeline Martinez said.
That’s a profound lesson, something they will surely remember long after geometry formulas have deserted them.
Meanwhile, at the Hamilton Library, an exercise in frugality has sparked a surge of visitors drawn to “the coupon box,” a simple-as-it-gets means of saving money.
George Conwell, the library director, placed a small box in the library lobby as part of a “give or take” coupon program. Library patrons could drop off their unused or unwanted coupons and pick up one or two of their own.
The coupon box proved instantly popular and now requires the attention of several volunteers to sort and organize the deluge of coupons.
Residents lured to the library by the coupon bonanza reap another reward — instant access to an array of services, equipment and materials that go far beyond the simple collection of books they may expect.
Both the involvement of the Trenton students and the ingenuity of the coupon exchange illustrate what the National and Community Service study detected: While the number of volunteers working through traditional organizations has remained stable, the number of “informal” volunteers rose by 31 percent, from 15.2 million in 2007 to 19.9 million in 2008.
The recession continues to take its toll in more ways than we can count. But the emerging trend of “do-it-yourself” service is helping to knit communities together with strands of strength and compassion to better withstand the barrage.
Copyright, 2010, The Times, Trenton N.J. All Rights Reserved.