By Mark Terranova, Associate Director, The Shriver Center

On Saturday, October 25, in coordination with Homecoming activities, many students will start their day by literally heading out "Into the Streets" to participate in one of UMBC's growing number of annual community service events.

Into the Streets -- a tradition here at UMBC -- is a project designed to introduce students to service through a one day activity that both meets a specific community need and introduces students to the values and rewards of serving others.

This year, students have the option of helping with food distribution with the Salvation Army, cleaning up our local UMBC community along Shelbourne Avenue and supporting a local Catonsville event with much needed volunteer support.

If you are interested in participating in any of these opportunities, please stop by the Student Involvement Center on the 2nd floor of the Commons or e-mail explore@umbc.edu.

Into the Streets is the latest event sponsored by a multi-year initiative called UMBC Serves, the coordination of multiple UMBC departments and student organizations committed to service to the community. At a recent meeting, representatives from the Student Life Office, the Office of Residential Life, the Meyerhoff Scholars Program, Athletic Community Outreach, Hillel and the Golden Key International Honour Society and The Shriver Center met to discuss future opportunities for partnership and support to ensure that UMBC's commitment to the larger community is effective, coordinated, and representative of the diversity and talent of our campus.

It is our hope that as we continue to meet, faculty and staff will also continue to participate in volunteer and service-learning initiatives. The list of engaged faculty is far too long to list in this column, and many have been mentioned in previous columns, evidence that the spirit of Ernest Boyer's Engaged Campus called for in the early 1990s is alive and well at UMBC. Civic engagement is the duty of faculty, staff, and students alike, and UMBC responds to that duty.

UMBC Serves hopes to launch a Web site this year to promote our initiatives and continue to meet each semester to coordinate our work. If you or your department are interested in participating in this process, please to not hesitate to contact me at terranov@umbc.edu.