Work and Fun in Little Rock

PC's Notebook
Day 5 - World Changers Little Rock

Wednesday was a short day for everyone as students were allowed to take the afternoon off and enjoy the sights and attractions of Greater Little Rock.

Some groups took advantage of Wild River Country, which is only a few miles from JA Fair High School. Others enjoyed the Little Rock River Market, which is downtown next to the Arkansas River. Still others took in dinner at a number of local eateries and a movie.

Things were back to normal on Thursday as crews worked all day at project sites, trying to get in a position to finish everything up on Friday.

-Tim Yarbrough
Project Coordinator

PS: The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette ran an article on World Changers today. Below is the text of the article:

300 youths aid LR elderly, disabled
Volunteers with Southern Baptist group repairing roofs in city

BY ALLISON NICHOLS
ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
Nearly 300 youth volunteers descended on Little Rock’s rooftops this week shingling homes in need of repair and doing other work.

Megan Wilson, 14, of Duluth, Ga., is spending part of her summer vacation for the second year with World Changers, a Southern Baptist missionary organization that works with communities to fix up houses for elderly or disabled homeowners who might not otherwise be able to afford repairs.

“It brings us as a group closer to God,” Megan said, explaining why she “really, really enjoy[s] this trip.”

World Changers volunteers are repairing homes in Little Rock for the third straight summer. This year the organization is sending 23,000 junior high, high school and college students to 95 communities in the world, said John Bailey, the team leader for World Changers at the North American Mission Board, a missionary organization with the Southern Baptist Convention.

“We would like to see these teenagers return to their communities and see their lives as an opportunity to serve others,” Bailey said.

Casey Rawls, 22, a World Changers spokesman who has worked with the mission for four summers, said one of the best things about the program is that the volunteers form a partnership with community leaders.

The city’s Housing and Neighborhood Programs Department identifies the houses through an application process and spends $50,000 for the supplies and materials using federal Community Development Block Grants. Homeowners who are 62 or older or drawing disability are eligible to apply for the program as long as they meet certain income- level requirements, said George Brown, housing programs assistant with the department.

By the end of the week, World Changers aims to have repaired 25 homes, which would bring its total in Little Rock during the three years to 75 homes. Brown said all told, World Changes has saved the city $750,000 in labor costs.

And Rawls said the work benefits the student volunteers, too.

“To see the joy and excitement in the homeowners’ faces just blows them away,” she said. “It changes their world at the same time that they’re changing the people in Little Rock’s world.”

Altha Richard, 78, has lived 53 years in her Chester Street house, which is getting a new roof and a fresh coat of paint this week.

“I’m so grateful and thankful,” she said, expressing regret that she couldn’t bake for the volunteers as she used to do for area schoolchildren. “They’ll never know how much I thank them.

Copyright - Arkansas Democrat-Gazette