Durfee Hosts First Volunteer Fair

April 09, 2018

Durfee Hosts First Volunteer Fair

Ismah Ahmed'18

Hilltop Reporter

-Photo by: Hilltop Staff

Mr. Farias speaking to a learn to serve student who volunteered

at the event

Fall River- B.M.C. Durfee High School hosted it's first volunteer fair in the Luke Urban Field house where the junior class was invited to meet and learn about local non-profits. On April 5th, Durfee opened into doors to a total of 38 local organizations to introduce themselves to the Class of 2019.

Students from Learn to serve, a Durfee High School class dedicated to community service, volunteered at the event. "The purpose of the event is to expose Durfee High School students to nonprofits in the greater Fall River area. These nonprofits are looking for volunteers," said Derek Farias, Learn to Serve director. "Collectively we worked with the Career Center, the Youth Works, the Mayor's Youth Council, Give Back Time, and the high school. We started planning at the end of January."

The event was a way to promote Durfee's Learn to Serve class and encourage students to actively volunteer in the community. Students from Learn to Serve use Give Back Time to look for opportunities in the area."Give back time is an online tracking service where students can track their community service hours," Farias stated.

-Photo by: Hilltop Staff

Students speaking to a local volunteering organization.

Student Rose Defendre, a junior here at Durfee "learned a lot about businesses" she didn't know. "It was a good opportunity for juniors."

"We targeted junior's because as a senior next year students can sign up for my class Learn to serve which is based on community serve. We want to prep them to make them aware of all the different nonprofits in the greater Fall River area that are looking for volunteers," said Mr. Farias when speaking in terms of choosing the class of 2019.

"My friends took up the opportunity and they loved it," Junior Skyler Souza said "They also loved it when some of the people (Durfee High Learn to Serve Volunteers) helped them figure out what they wanted to do."

Kaysey Rose, a senior who volunteered at the event stated that "it was a good experience and I liked seeing all the opportunities. A lot of the juniors seemed to really like it."

"I think Learn to Serve is a good opportunity for students to get involved in their community and get something out of it and be rewarded," said Rose.

"I think this is an absolutely wonderful event. Collectively, its taken us a very long time and hard work to get this together and its gonna be a great success. And hopefully, this is something we have every single year here at Durfee," Farias said.