Creighton University’s Circle K kicked off its Fall Day of Service, where Jays go out to serve the Omaha community. Circle K explored Omaha and served at Open Door Mission Lydia House.
At Circle K’s annual Fall Day of Service, members from multiple schools in the Nebraska-Iowa district gathered for a day full of exciting events. Students from Creighton University, Midland University, Drake University and the University of Iowa met at the Henry Doorly Zoo to kick off the event, hosted on Sept. 20.
Students explored the Old Market area for lunch and then concluded the evening by volunteering at Open Door Mission Lydia House, a local homeless shelter in Omaha.
“I really enjoyed it. It was fun to get to know the people at Creighton that are in Circle K more and establish some friendships,” Wil McAvoy, a freshman in the College of Nursing, said.
But the intention behind the event ran deeper than just pure enjoyment and a free lunch.
“Circle K International is a service-based club,” College of Nursing sophomore Molly Esch, president of the Creighton branch of Circle K, said. “We do a lot of volunteering for the community within our school, as well as the local Omaha community.”
The club’s actions aim toward achieving the club’s three main pillars: leadership, fellowship and service. Circle K’s mission is to “live to serve and love to serve.”
The Fall Day of Service event also offered students an opportunity to connect with new people and spend time out in Omaha, while giving back to the community.
“It [Fall Day of Service] cultivates all of the tenets … it shows you that you can have fun while serving others and that you’re doing good things for the community,” Esch said.
As students became better acquainted with one another at the zoo and during lunch, they were able to work as a cohesive unit when it came time to volunteer at the Open Door Mission Lydia House. During this time, some were tasked with serving a hot, nutritious meal to those at the shelter, while others helped staff prepare food for the upcoming week.
All hands were needed at Open Door Mission Lydia House, as it serves more than 5,360 meals each day to men, women and children experiencing hunger, according to opendoormission.org.
As a result of these efforts, students from Creighton and the surrounding colleges were able to contribute to the vision of the organization, which is to meet the needs of individuals and families to help break the cycle of poverty and homelessness.
Vice President of Membership Leona Nguyen, a sophomore in the College of Arts and Sciences, said that she observed several of Creighton’s Jesuit values while doing service, specifically “men and women for and with others.”
“I guess we’ll lighten up their day … we make jokes with them … we ask them how their day was. Show them that we care, and that probably lightens their day,” Nguyen said.
From the event, Circle K’s members were driven to make a long-lasting impact in their community one action at a time.
“You can talk a lot about how you want to change the world, but going out and doing the small things for others is what really changes the world. It [service] changes the circumstances for people on a big and small level, I feel,” McAvoy said. “Just having that one conversation with that one person … can help lighten someone’s day.”