By Mike Lopez
Senior Staff Writer

To some, volunteering is an occasional habit, something done once a week or a few times a month to throw on a résumé and talk about.

For Elizabeth Jackson, one of two senior Student Volunteer Fellows, it is something that has defined her life at Bates. Naturally, she doesn’t think it’s that big of a deal.

“There was never any moment I really got motivated,” said Jackson, a Durham, NH resident. “It has just been almost like a natural progression. I was directly involved for three years beforehand, and now it became my turn to start recruiting, training, and increasing the opportunities these programs have. It was just the next step.”

Her role as a Fellow has extended to Lewiston, Auburn and beyond.

“We are in charge of involving students with community projects, volunteer events, mentoring and literacy programs, and doing community work in low income housing,” she explained.

As for specific projects the list, according to Jackson, is endless. She mentions the Longley Mentoring Program, the Montello Reading Club, and the Blake Street Towers, a project that works with the lowest income Lewiston housing in an effort to build a community within the housing complex. She brings up the Maine People’s Alliance, the Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Coalition, and talks about work within the Somali community.

To top it off, the volunteer program at Bates is expanding.

“Bates is actually known for having one of the best service-learning volunteer programs out of comparable schools. We are one of the first to have a student-run volunteer program through fellowships. Additionally, this is the first year that every opportunity we have advertised we have had more people respond than we could accept. Usually in the past we couldn’t get enough.”

Her work through volunteering inspired Jackson, a sociology major with a minor in Spanish and anthropology, to do an Honors thesis, examining how volunteering is affected on the global scale through transnational corporations.

“It’s kind of a long title,” jokes Jackson. “Officially, it’s the Role of Non-Governmental Organizations in Transnational Social Movements: An Examination of the FTAA.”

Not surprisingly, with the long title, her thesis finished out at 148 pages. Also not surprisingly, she won her Honors defense.

“It was definitely a lot of work, as you can imagine,” says Jackson, who spent the past couple months hibernating in the computer labs of Pettengill. “I spent more time on it than I have on any other one thing in my life.”

Comparing it back to her work as a volunteer Fellow, a position she shares with senior John Scott Johnson and sophomores Chris Casey and Katie Seamon, Jackson is quick to find similarities.

“Both examine different groups of people sometimes marginalized, the thesis looking at disparity on international level. At the same time, I do the local work to sort of meld groups together too, and that creates more of a community sense. They are connected on different scales, I would definitely say.”

Jackson is excited to continue her service work in the future. This summer, she is traveling to China to participate in a program where she will teach English to local students. After that, she hopes to end up in Washington, D.C., furthering her exploration of international sustainable development.

“It’s been a very intense experience at Bates,” she notes, “but definitely amazing.”






Respond to this article.