UA’s University Fellows Perform Service Projects in Marion

Note: Students will be working on landscaping around the Perry County Courthouse and the UA building in Marion as well as other projects from 9 to 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, May 25, in Marion. For details, contact Richard LeComte media relations, rllecomte@ur.ua.edu, 205/348-3782.

TUSCALOOSA, Ala.  — During May, student members of The University of Alabama’s University Fellows Experience perform a variety of community-centered projects and initiatives in Marion as a part of their freshman year Black Belt Experience.

Projects include storytelling, landscaping the Perry County Courthouse and working on the basketball courts at the Lincoln Normal School.

This year’s Black Belt Experience cohort consists of 31 students, 10 student leaders and four UA Honors College staff members. They collaborate on 13 Black Belt projects. The program, in its eighth year, is a part of 57 Miles, the UA Honors College’s partnership with Perry County.

Among the projects are:

Front Porch Sessions: Fellows create a visual and auditory storytelling experience through documenting and publishing interviews with people in Perry County.

Smart Art Students: Fellows engage Francis Marion School youth in an arts curriculum.

Launching Leadership: Fellows use science education and mentor-mentee relationships as a means of developing leadership abilities among students at Francis Marion High School, culminating in the launch of a student-made rocket.

Government Assistance Project: Fellows work with Sowing Seeds of Hope — a local community health initiative — to encourage and support enrollment in Medicare by providing educational pamphlets and hosting sign-up workshops.

Operation Play: Fellows help students at Francis Marion School by promoting leadership, development of team roles and prosocial behaviors through competitive soccer.

For a complete list of projects, contact Rick Lewis, University Fellows, at rblewis1@crimson.ua.edu.

The University Fellows Experience is a community of elite scholars from diverse disciplines who share a similar passion of being change agents through commitment to leadership and service. Following the classical purpose of education — the production of good citizens — the University Fellows Experience strives to prepare the most able and dedicated students at UA for remarkable lives of leadership in, and service to, their community, state, nation and world.

The students, all of whom are enrolled in UA’s Honors College, spent the academic year researching issues affecting the Black Belt and developing programs to help address some of those issues.