More than 50 Saints went south for spring break to work on their tans – while they were building houses with Habitat for Humanity.
The students spent a week at different work sites as part of the College’s annual spring break service trip organized by the campus Habitat chapter. One crew went to Avery County in North Carolina, and the rest went to two sites in Charleston and Marion in South Carolina.
Chapter president Abby James-Vickery ’25 put all the pieces together to sign up students, arrange transportation and assign work crews. Each site was at a different point in the building process: the Charleston house was started from scratch by building the concrete foundation; the Avery County house was halfway completed; and the Marion house was ready for its finishing touches.
“There were students from many different majors, including a lot of bio majors this year,” she said. “On these trips, we’re not just building houses, we’re building community.”
Siena is one of many colleges that participates in the annual Collegiate Challenge sponsored by Habitat, offered as an “alternative spring break.” Never even driven a nail? No problem. James-Vickery said you don’t need any building experience to sign up for a Habitat trip. In fact, the nonprofit trains all volunteers for their work.
“They assume that everyone is just learning to build, and all volunteers are welcome,” said James-Vickery.
She said Saints usually head south for the annual Habitat service trip, since the Carolinas are warmer this time of year and have a very strong Habitat presence, which offers a wider choice of sites. Sometimes the crews end up working on a house along with the people who will be living in it when it’s completed.
If you’d like to get involved in Habitat in this area, Siena’s chapter has a local building site in Schenectady that is open for work throughout the academic year. About five to 10 students head over on Saturdays to help out. Interested? Email ag08jame@siena.edu.
“While on these trips, you might initially know a few people in your group, but that quickly changes. By the end of the trip, you know your whole group because you spend SO much time with them for a week and really get to learn about each other. Your main purpose is to work with the people from Habitat, but you have a great time on and off the site with LOTS of laughs!! One of the best feelings, when you are working on a build, is knowing that this is going to be a finished house one day, and you had a part in it.”
Jayden Hillage-Scribner ’25
“All of us were able to work in a mix of teams, being adaptable to whenever we made mistakes - we're not experts at building houses! It was great to see everyone's positive attitudes in these situations. I remember one group working on the basement of one house (which they called "the hole") and we would hear their cheers all the way from the other house as they celebrated each and every foam board they successfully put up together. That's definitely the energy on the trip!”
Rithika Patnam ’26
