By Minh Tran ’23, special contributor
Passion
Volunteering at the age of 12, Holly Balchunas still continues to follow her passion in college. As an LVC student, Holly has done a bunch of service projects with her friends and other fellow students. She loves helping people with disabilities and others and participating in projects that are helpful to people in need.
“The satisfaction of knowing that I am helping others is what motivates me the most [to volunteer],” the senior early childhood education and special education major said. “It gives me time to step away from my own problems and stressors and put my efforts into helping other people.”
The affection for volunteering can be found in Holly’s family. Her parents and twin brothers are all involved in Special Olympics Lebanon County. Her parents are an inspiring resource for Holly in volunteering. They are always very motivating and supportive of her volunteer work. In middle school, Holly volunteered as a tutor for a 5th grade homework club. She also dedicated most of her time in high school to the Special Olympics and a special needs cheer team in Mechanicsburg.
Since her senior year of college, Holly feels that she has a lot on her plate and struggles with finding time to participate in volunteer activities.
“I pretty much participate whenever I have some free time.” Holly usually dedicates about two hours per week to doing some sort of service with LVC.
Services at LVC
Besides enjoying working with Lebanon County Special Olympics since she was young, her favorite service at LVC is Habitat for Humanity. With this organization, volunteers go to a home in Lebanon and help with construction and repairs so that a low-income family can move in and live there in better conditions.
“This was a new experience for me and something I had never thought of doing before. I got to use the tools and do tasks I had never done previously. It was fun and beneficial for the family.”
On campus, there are some interesting nights of service that allow students to spend their free time outside of class volunteering. Some of these nights of service include writing letters to troops, painting signs or making cards for women with breast cancer, making ornaments for families of LVC faculty and packing boxes for toys for tots. There are approximately thirty people at each event.
“It is a great place to socialize and interact with other people who enjoy helping out.”
Fruitfulness
Being a student in the early and special education department, Holly hopes to work with young children and disabled people. After graduation, she will be teaching middle school autistic support. Volunteering has helped her gain various strengths and skills that will assist and enhance her teaching path in the future.
As a young educator, Holly realized that the greatest thing in doing volunteer work is compassion. When people understand one’s tough situation, they can behave more appropriately, show a better attitude, and help them go through it.
“I feel that I can really put myself into someone else’s shoes and understand the struggles that they may have. This helps me to stay motivated to volunteer because it allows me to understand the cause I am helping.”
Furthermore, throughout volunteer work, Holly appreciates things that she is lucky to have until this present moment. She realized that there are so many people in the world with such high needs, which makes her problems seem small.
“It gives me time to step away from my own problems and stressors and put my efforts into helping other people.”
Holly is proud of herself that volunteering helped her develop better communication skills which will be beneficial when communicating with parents and assisting students and lead her closer to some leadership roles on campus. She is the president of the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) as well as of the Kappa Delta Pi International Honor Society (KDP).
Volunteering helped this young college student discover insights about herself and realize the struggles of people around her. When volunteering, people will realize that each person has a story of who they are, how they are and how they turn in tough circumstances. Volunteering is an experience that will stay with people and their whole life.