Newsfeed
Printer-Friendly ModeRoberts Fellows host fundraiser for the poor
October 19, 2009 —
The intense cycle of poverty in Third World countries presents a desperate call for help.
Friday night, members of the 2009–10 Roberts Fellowship Program answered this call by hosting a fundraiser for the nonprofit organization Food for the Poor, Inc.
The Roberts Fellowship Program is a competitive leadership program on the SVSU campus founded by Donna Roberts, former Corporate Council for Dow Chemical Company.
Food for the Poor, Inc., works to provide daily meals, build shelters, improve infrastructures and aid disaster victims. Its efforts span across 17 different countries throughout the Caribbean and Central America.
Food for the Poor’s mission is “to link the church of the first world with the church of the Third World that helps both the material poor and the poor in spirit,” according to Saginaw Valley alumni and presenter Tricia Szymanski.
Szymanski demonstrated the cycle of poverty that engulfs the majority of the Earth’s population through an “If the World Were a Village of 100 People” activity.
Jaws dropped all around the Student Activities Room as the 2004 graduate presented the information.
According to Szymanski’s research, if the Earth were a village of 100 people, only one person would have a college education and only one would own a computer. Six people would possess 60 percent of the world’s wealth. Fifty would suffer from malnutrition and seventy would be illiterate.
The Roberts Fellowship Program has taken an active stance in fighting poverty by raising more than $1,200 through gas pumping, donation collection tables and the Friday night event.
“We are going to see a lot of this when we go to Asia,” said political science junior and Roberts Fellow Kirsten Whitlock, “And some of us want to be part of the solution someday.”
Of founder Donna Roberts, nursing professor Sara Hinderer said, “She had a vision of giving expanding opportunities to students who otherwise would not have the opportunity to open their minds.”
Thus the Roberts Fellowship Program was founded in 1997 and includes a leadership class in the fall semester, a comprehensive survey course focused on Asia in the winter and a final trip to locations in East Asia in the summer.
“Getting in to the Roberts Fellowship Program is like a celebration of the culmination of everything I’ve done at SVSU,” Whitlock said.
Members of the program engage in and sponsor service projects throughout the year.
“It is a way to represent our school positively and promote leadership on campus,” said Jessica Winger, an early childhood education and Roberts Fellow senior.
The All-Nighter for the Poor featured a brief presentation before a two-hour talent show judged by SVSU President Eric R. Gilbertson, Resident Director Marcus Bennett and Student Life Coordinator Kim Brandimore.
The event was filled with entertaining acts that included a flash back to the 1990s with exercise science senior Torry Robbennolt fully clad in a strategically stuffed sports bra and pink sweat pants as she performed a classic Spice Girls song.
Accounting junior and winner of the competition Steven Gould enchanted the crowd with his performance of numerous tribute songs that featured his talent as a guitarist.
“It’s not just a fellowship,” Whitlock said. “It’s a fellowship that gives back to the community.”