Category:

    Chinatown Adventure
    Amy Leung, Priscilla Chan chad@hcs.harvard.edu
    Chinatown Adventure (CHAD) is an awesome way to work with kids, learn more about Boston, learn leadership skills, and become part of a great staff of junior and senior counselors. It's a 7-week summer camp that runs out of Boston's Chinatown and Summer 2000 looks to be one of the best in our 14 year history. The program pairs up a senior counselor with a teenage junior counselor, and together, they lead a group of 10 children through a self-designed curriculum combining classroom activities, numerous field trips, and a final presentation at the camp wide Final Show. Recruiting for senior counselors begins in March. Please feel free to contact us for additional information, an application, or a rambling of our many memories of the camp!
    Chinatown Committee
    Julie Harms and Allen Ho, Co-chairs chtn@hcs.harvard.edu
          Boston Chinatown is the oldest and most isolated of Asian-populated neighborhoods in New England. Its residents suffer from the lowest median income and the highest rate of overcrowding of all the neighborhoods in Boston. The more than 150 enthusiastic volunteers of the Chinatown Committee devote themselves to helping the community face its challenges and strengthen its cultural identity. Volunteers may serve as counselors (Afterschool and Teen Programs), mentors (Big Sibling Program), or tutors (Quincy School, Elderly, and ESL Programs) for some 300 Chinatown residents.

      Whether leading a child on an apple-picking adventure or teaching a class of 30 adults how to say hello, the Chinatown Committee programs offer a tremendously rewarding experience for anyone interested in Asian culture and/or community service. Committment is light and volunteers do not need to speak an Asian language to participate. Please feel free to contact us to learn more!
    Fresh Pond Enrichment Program
    Meg Nelson (manelson@fas.harvard.edu) fpep@hcs.harvard.edu
   
    Harvard Emergency Medical Services
    Dave Ramsey hems@hcs.harvard.edu
    Harvard Emergency Medical Services is a public service organization that offers three primary activities. First, it offers the opportunity to serve as a Third Rider on a Cambridge ambulance. Third Riders assist Cambridge paramedics and EMTs, providing excellent exposure to many levels of the health care system. Second, HEMS serves as a provider of CPR instruction for PBHA programs and for other members of the Harvard community. Lastly, the newly initiated "CPR Schools" program sends HEMS volunteers to local high schools to teach CPR. If you are interested in either becoming a CPR instructor or a Third Rider, please contact Dave Ramsey at hems@hcs.harvard.edu.
    Harvard Friends of the American Red Cross
    Richard Kim redcross@hcs.harvard.edu
    The Harvard Friends of the American Red Cross offer volunteer opportunities in disaster, First Aid/CPR instruction, and AIDS Education that serve the needs of the entire city of Boston. Work alongside seasoned veterans of the Boston Chapter in providing on-the-scene relief to fire and flood victims, or become professionally licensed to teach CPR or AIDS classes to people of all levels. Boston relies on the American Red Cross for public relief efforts, and the American Red Cross relies on people like you. Help can't wait--join today.
    Housing Opportunities Program
    Paul Niehaus hop@hcs.harvard.edu
    The Housing Opportunities Program is a microfinance program dedicated to the prevention of homelessness in the Boston metro region. HOP runs a revolving loan fund and provides no-interest credit and counseling to clients in danger of being evicted from their housing. The clients we serve represent the working poor or low-income families who often fall behind in their rent payments due to circumstances such as job transition or family illness.

HOP is run entirely by undergraduate volunteers review client applications and conducting personal interviews. If you are interested in seeking structural solutions to poverty and destitution in the United States, or simply in the logistics of running a non-profit loan program (billing, collection, legal issues, grant-writing, public speaking), get in contact with HOP. We are also involved in research and community building around affordable housing and urban development concerns.
    MIHNUET (Music In Hospitals and Nursing homes Using Entertainment as Therapy)
    Rachel Brodin (brodin@fas) or Mi Jung Kim (mjkim@fas) mihnuet@hcs.harvard.edu
    Harvard-Radcliffe MIHNUET 2001-2002 (Music In Hospitals and Nursing homes Using Entertainment as Therapy) MIHNUET is a public service program that brings live music from the Harvard community into local hospitals, nursing homes, hospices, and homeless shelters. The goal of MIHNUET is to build positive relationships between students and the elderly, ill, or needy via the very special gift of music. Past volunteers have been successful performing in a wide variety of musical genres, including classical, jazz, folk, popular, and a cappella. You may perform in solo or with an ensemble, and the MIHNUET board members can help you put together an ensemble if you don’t already have one set up. Based on your performance preferences (i.e. days of the week you are available to perform, musical genre, etc.), a MIHNUET coordinator will arrange performances for you at a suitable nursing home, hospital, hospice, or homeless shelter. Scheduling is flexible, but volunteers are expected to perform at least three times a semester. If you have any questions about MIHNUET, please contact the Co-Directors, Rachel Brodin at brodin@fas or Mi Jung Kim at mjkim@fas. Also, check out Mihnuet’s web page at: http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~mihnuet.
    Mission Hill After School Program
    Natalie Guerrier mhasp@hcs.harvard.edu
    The Mission Hill After School Program (MHASP) was created in 1983 at the request of the Mission Main Tenant Task Force. The program began with about 20 kids, meeting only twice a week in Building 19, a small auditorium in the Mission Main housing project. It then moved to Harvard's School of Public Health. Once the program grew too large, it found a new site at the Wentworth Institute of Technology, where it now occupies six classrooms. MHASP serves approximately 50 children between the ages of five and fourteen, and meets four times a week, Monday through Thursday afternoons. There are four different age groups, each with three to four coordinators, who are in charge of the classroom and also create curriculum for the entire semester. The program is run by four directors. This semester's directors are James Allison '00, Vlad Bystricky '00, Natalie Guerrier '01, and Charity Shumway '01. For more information, please contact Natalie Guerrier (mhasp@hcs or guerr2@fas, 5-5526) or visit our web page at www.hcs.harvard.edu/~mhasp
    Partners for Empowering Neighborhoods
    David Shapiro/Grant Wiens pen@hcs.harvard.edu
    PEN (Partners for Empowering Neighborhoods) is a collaboration between community groups and college students which offers comprehensive educational services to adults in public housing and homeless shelters in the Boston/Cambridge area. PEN volunteers teach English as a Second Language, Computer Literacy, and GED/Academic Enrichment classes. Through these classes and one-on-one tutoring, residents of homeless shelters and public housing --many of whom are recent immigrants --are equipped to overcome barriers to their continued education and employment.
    VISIONS
    Anjali Chelliah, Diarra Lamar visions@hcs.harvard.edu
    VISIONS is a chapter of VISIONS Worldwide, an international, student-run nonprofit organization that works to combat the global AIDS crisis through education and empowerment. VISIONS Harvard members volunteer at local AIDS service organizations, such as a community center and meals-on-wheels program for people living with HIV. We also organize on-campus awareness events, including a speaker series and World AIDS Awareness Week events. This semester, we are developing a peer education program for local youth. If you're interested in helping to prevent the spread of HIV, please contact us and get involved!