Big Event: School-wide Volunteer Day

The Big Event is a nation-wide college service day.  According to OU's Big Event website, Big Event started in 1982 at Texas A&M University.  Now, 31 years later, there are Big Event chapters in more than 60 colleges.

Source: bigevent.ou.edu

At OU, Big Event is one of the favorite, most well-known annual OU traditions.  Most students are aware of Big Event, thanks to its great size and involvement of students and community.  According to the website, OU's Big Event has about 5,000 student volunteers, faculty and staff participants every year that go out into the Norman and Oklahoma City communities.  

Student organizations, classes and friends form groups to volunteer together.  The Big Event coordinators find and organize places for the student groups to volunteer in different capacities, including painting, yard work, cleaning, etc.

source: bigevent.ou.edu

I like the idea of Big Event, it allows for students to volunteer and see other aspects of the Norman community outside of OU, while in the comfort of their social groups.  Many OU students would like to volunteer to add to their resume, to give back to the community or to simply fill their time with something beneficial, but they may not know of all the opportunities there are to volunteer in the community.  Big Event shows them these opportunities.

For one Saturday, students wake up early, listen to our university President David Boren speak briefly, then divide into their different assignments around Norman and OKC.  The students are able to get out of their comfort zone at OU and give back to the community.

However, I do have some reservations about Big Event, namely that it IS just one day.  Many, if not most, students may participate in Big Event and put it on their resumes as if they contributed some meaningful service to the community.  In reality, there are not so many amazing things you can do in just one day.  Big Event is good to give students a taste of volunteering, but it should not be the end of their volunteering.  

Luckily, OU has also seen this problem and initiated some service projects throughout the year on Saturdays.  This, in my opinion, was a great step towards truly instilling the value of volunteering throughout the year.

My hope is that students continue to participate in Big Event and fall in love with volunteering and feel empowered to, then, reach out to the community throughout the semester on a more regular basis.