Passing It On
Service Trip to Lesotho Changes Lives

For the third time in the last four years, Wittenberg community members volunteered their time and talents in the South African Kingdom of Lesotho, immersing themselves in a new culture and greeting young faces huddled daily at the gate of their compound.

“Pretty amazing” was the shared sentiment for an experience that Inge Williams ’08 said was “life-changing in so many ways.”

In 2006, Williams was part of a record number of students who participated in the trip. Wittenberg Associate Professor of History Scott Rosenberg accompanied 29 students in 2005 and 22 in 2003, but this year, he was overwhelmed by more than 60 student applications.

While in Lesotho, among the 40 poorest nations in the world, the group volunteered with construction projects, including building eight houses with Habitat for Humanity, and closely interacted with children in orphanages and a pediatric clinic. The participants also attended 10 guest lectures at the National University of Lesotho on issues ranging from gender and development to strategies and failures in combating poverty and the AIDS epidemic. Service, however, was the biggest component of the trip.

Thrivent Financial for Lutherans and Wittenberg’s chapter of Habitat for Humanity contributed funds to make the service projects in Lesotho possible. Participants paid their own way on the trip, in the process gaining six credit hours or credit for community service hours required for graduation.

This year’s trip also included increased collaboration with members of the Lesotho Work Camp Association (LWA), a social service organization comprised of local young people who were either still studying or were volunteering for regional development.

In addition, Wittenberg students visited the Baylor/Bristol-Myers Squibb Children’s Clinical Center of Excellence, the only children’s clinic in Lesotho, where they played hokey-pokey and soccer with the children, many of whom are HIV-positive.
“To see our students play with terminally-ill patients and spend time with children who don’t often get the one-on-one attention that they require, and above all to watch the attachment those kids form with our students, is overpowering,” Rosenberg said.

The group also visited three orphanages, where students helped build seed beds, set up farms, planted fruit trees and cleared fields.
“A lot of orphanages struggle to get food,” Rosenberg said. “Now they can grow their own food.”

Williams spoke in awe of “the genuine warmth” of the Lesotho culture, which all the participants studied in-depth prior to embarking on the trip.
When students made donations of clothes and other personal items, “they really treasured the gifts you gave them,” she said.

“It’s a powerful experience to see not just how much of a difference they’re making outside their lives,” Rosenberg added, “but also to see how much the students learn, and how they change from embracing these new experiences.”

Arundati Dandapani ’07

– Ryan Maurer