Ole Miss Cares assists Long Beach school

Need of those on coast affected by Katrina was great

Jillian Frys

The student-faculty relief group Ole Miss Cares traveled to Long Beach over the weekend to set up mobile classrooms for Harper-McCaughan Elementary School.

One hundred twenty students traveled by bus to the Gulf Coast city to set up mobile classrooms and sort supplies for the school. These students represented every segment of the student population at the university, according to Sparky Reardon, dean of students. Reardon organized this trip along with Pam Lawhead, associate professor of computer science.

Individual students, as well as groups representing the Associated Student Body, Habitat for Humanity, Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College, ROTC, Phi Delta Theta, Delta Kappa Epsilon, Sigma Alpha Epsilon and Interfraternity Council all were represented at the service trip.

“It was one of the most positive things I’ve seen at this university in a long time,” Reardon said. The students worked alongside the teachers and school members they were charged to assist. Because of the group’s efforts, the school will reopen two weeks earlier than scheduled.

Before going to work Saturday, university faculty and students were able to see just how badly Hurricane Katrina devastated the area.

“Everything you’ve seen on television, just put that out of your head,” Reardon said. “It just doesn’t do it justice.”

The IFC, along with providing workers for the relief effort made a $1,000 donation to the university to assist future service trips to the area.

FEMA was supposed to supply food for the relief workers, but when this did not happen, rather than leave the burden of feeding 120 with the people of Long Beach, IFC made the donation.

“When we got down there and saw how great the need was for everything, we decided to go ahead and donate the money,” James Watts, IFC president, said.

Like many towns affected by Katrina, the people of Long Beach have had to do much of the rebuilding on their own.

The efforts of this group not only opened up the school earlier, but eased some of the workload on the community.

“Someone who would have had to do this now could spend the day with their family,” Reardon said.

There is talk of other trips to aid the relief effort, but no definite plans yet.

Reardon strongly encourages all students looking to assist in the recovery effort to contact officials on the Gulf Coast.

“You can’t truly appreciate the resilient spirit of the people if you haven’t been,” he said.