Habitat for Humanity Builds
One of the student organizations I have become passionate about during my time at Vanderbilt is Habitat for Humanity. I went from being on the Junior Exec Board to becoming a fundraising chair and running the Commodore Trot 5k for two years, to finally becoming one of the co-presidents. It may not be your favorite organization, but it definitely offers some fun weekend opportunities. This past weekend, I volunteered at a Sunday build with 18 other Vandy students.
Builds run from 6:30am-3:30pm with a 30 minute lunch break, but they really start much earlier for us. Volunteers receive a 5:30am wake up call because we know it’s tough to wake up before the sun. Don’t worry! We also schedule builds for non-home game days. We all meet together at 6am and then carpool over to Edison Park in Antioch, TN where Habitat for Humanity of Greater Nashville is currently building 10 houses in one neighborhood. It all started as a beautiful morning with some crisp weather and rays of sunlight.
We did various activities including painting walls and ceilings, using a nail gun to install baseboard and window bases, caulking holes and cracks, and using the power saw to cut baseboards and window boards. We all had a great time full of plenty of jokes and some painted faces.
We broke for lunch at 11:30am and had pizza, chips and cookies on the side of the road and then re-commenced while full bellies. We actually ended up finishing a bit early after cleaning up our messes and prepping the house to have flooring installed during the week.