Category: Community

How Helping Kids Build a Strong Sense of Community Can Improve Their Confidence and Learning

April 25, 2022
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Have you heard the term “branding yourself?” It’s a new term being used by young entrepreneurs and being exploited by young millennials. The new trend is to brand yourself. Give yourself a logo, pictures of yourself that portray yourself a specific way, a motto, and most importantly, a website that uses specific colors and all…

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Service Learning: Nurturing Children’s Sense of Charity in the Classroom

April 21, 2022
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It was mid-December, shortly before Christmas vacation. The elementary and middle school students had just finished their annual Christmas carol performance at the local senior center. Teachers handed cards to their students, and the children started visiting people in the audience. I proudly watched one of my students, an 8-year-old girl, hesitantly approach an elderly…

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Rural Studio: An Architectural School Where Learning and Helping Others Go Hand in Hand

April 17, 2022
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“The initial sketch is always an emotion, not a concept.”—Sambo Mockbee As you drive along the two-lane highway into Newbern in the heart of Alabama’s Black Belt, you might experience a massive shift in your perception. There is something different about the architecture of the buildings downtown. The facilities along Highway 61 include a city…

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Our Need for Community Can’t Be Digitized

April 13, 2022
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Human beings harbor a deep need to belong. On a biological level, belonging is survival: If we’re not part of the herd, we’re left behind and die. In modern times, we need to belong to something larger than just ourselves to survive emotionally. We need to belong to feel accepted, loved, known, and, in a…

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Free Reads Through Community Deeds

April 12, 2022
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From the time I learned to read, libraries have been a sanctuary. As an adult, I have made my way with words, writing magazine articles and a few books. So, when I recently moved to a small neighborhood in Southwest Portland, Ore., I became fascinated by the number and variety of boxes located throughout the…

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How One Small-Town Doctor Is Helping Reshape His Community

April 9, 2022
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Nestled amidst the rolling hills of the Appalachian Mountains, in the heart of coal country, lies the small town of Williamson, West Virginia. Separated from its counterpart, South Williamson, Kentucky, by the Tug Fork River, Williamson is probably best known for an infamous feud—that of the Hatfields and McCoys. Though the area may be known…

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The Acts of Giving and Receiving: Volunteering in Your Community

April 7, 2022
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Have you ever had that warm fuzzy feeling when you help an elderly person carry their shopping, or return a wallet dropped by a parent struggling to cope with screaming children? Similarly, a simple smile from a stranger when your eyes meet whilst walking down the street can leave both parties with a spring in…

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Healing Through Human Connection

April 5, 2022
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Music, poetry, dance, and art have played an important part in our mental and physical well-being throughout history. According to studies commissioned by the UK Department for Culture, Media, and Sport, “Participation in the arts leads to significant improvements in health, that not only boost self-esteem, but also reduce feelings of isolation and exclusion.” Those…

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Urban Supremacy and the Dismantling of Rural Communities

March 22, 2022
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Commentary  Probably the worst of the multitude of villainous COVID restrictions came at the expense of churches, the forced closure of their doors. Coupled with this tragedy was the fact that while churches were empty, liquor stores remained open for business. And while this wasn’t true everywhere, in many areas, bars were allowed to open for…

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In Pursuit of the Normal

March 16, 2022
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Commentary RIDGWAY, Pennsylvania—While outsiders like to say there are more elk than people here in Elk County because of the abundance of the former and the sparse population of the latter, today is a different day as thousands of people from across Pennsylvania, New York, and Maryland descend here for this town’s annual Mountain Fest….

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