Students ditch Cancun and opt for Camden for spring break
Tuesday, March 31st, 2009
By: Elizabeth Fiedler
efiedler@whyy.org
For many U.S. college students, spring break is a time to party in warm, beachfront locations. But for some, it's a time to work for social justice. That's why more than 200 students are spending their spring break in Camden, New Jersey this year.
Transcript:
The students who spend their spring break in Camden have a very different experience from those downing margaritas at a Caribbean resort.
Jim Cummings is Director of the WorkGroup Program for Urban Promise Ministries.
Cummings: "We have painted school buses with brushes actually, but whatever the needs are I mean and it could be fixing or cleaning up bathrooms, painting clasrooms, building fences, helping get garden areas ready, landscaping projects, putting up basketball hoops — we did a couple of those last week."
Cummings says near the beginning of the week he gives the students a tour of the city. He says the sight of open-air drug dealing, prostitution, and so many boarded-up homes is an eye-opening experience for many of them.
This week, students are coming from King College in Tennessee.
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