It’s 07:15 on a Tuesday, and already the choir room at St. Joseph High School in Michigan, USA, is filled to capacity with members of the school’s Interact club.
With 147 members, they have maxed out the space and will need to find a larger space. For now, officers calmly go through committee reports and announcements, then linger afterward to talk about their major international service project, a trip to the Dominican Republic to install water filters.
One past participant, Grace Adams, talks about meeting a five-month-old boy who had lost his parents.
“His mother had left him, and his grandparents were dead. The village took turns taking care of him for a night,” recalls Grace. “Seeing how the village came together to raise him and try and make him a happy little boy moved me. I still get emotional thinking about it.”
The Interact program in southwest Michigan is thriving, a direct byproduct of a student mentoring program run by the Rotary Club of St. Joseph & Benton Harbor. Through Interact, young people ages 12-18 develop leadership skills and discover the power of community service.
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