Washburn Student Government Association, in collaboration with the Office of Student Involvement, are hosting the tenth annual Big Event at Washburn. The original “Big Event” started at Texas A&M University several years ago. They gathered students and went out in their community engaging in community service. It started out small before universities began to follow suit. In 2011, Washburn merged its similar project that began back in 1995, “Bods into the Street,” with the “Big Event.”

Washburn’s tenth annual Big Event will take place from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. April 30.

“I am mostly interested in doing this event because I know community service is really big for us and I just want to give back to the community in any way I can,” said Jayce Wessel, junior social work major. Wessel is the special event director for the WSGA and the person who oversees the planning of this year’s Big Event.

The Big Event is an annual community service event where students have the opportunity to go to various sites in Topeka and volunteer by giving back to the community. This year, 10 places around Topeka are selected to host volunteers. The students work out with the local agencies of Topeka and offer to volunteer for them. Some of the local agencies are the boys and girls club, Keep America Beautiful, Red Cross Society and Topeka Habitat for Humanity. Most of the volunteering work this year is groundskeeping, landscape work, food donations and closet organizing.

“This is one of the events of the year which makes me proud of being one of the bods. Volunteering helps us gain new skills necessary for the job market such as leadership, communication skills, dependability, time management, and decision making. The Big Event not only helps to gain experience in these all aspects, but also gives a chance to help the community.” said Megan Dorantes, junior public administration major.
A total of 98 Washburn students signed up for the events. 42 students from other student organizations have signed up to volunteer for the event. Four cabinet members of the WSGA are spearheading this event and 20 students from WSGA signed up to help.

The volunteers will be provided breakfast, T-shirts, water, lunch and transportation and will be sent out all over Topeka to several sites to engage in volunteer work. Since it’s the tenth year of the event, there are some exciting gifts for the students who will be volunteering.

Edited by: Alyssa Storm, Simran Shrestha

Word Count: 372
Writer’s
bio: Rakesh Swarnakar, [email protected] , freshman Computer and
information Science, and Mathematics major