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Adriana Jaimez. A.L. Brown High School junior and member of the Interact club, talks to Luis Perez in front of what will soon be the new Perez family home in Spencer. The Interact club volunteered with Habitat for Humanity on Saturday. Photo by Hugh Fisher.
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Catawba College student Nate Hill, right, helps measure siding with John Manik, a Catawba College employee, for Saturday's Habitat for Humanity work day. Local college students teamed with the Interact Club from A.L. Brown High in Kannapolis to assist. Photo by Hugh Fisher.
Buy a printBy Hugh Fisher
hfisher@salisburypost.com
SPENCER - According to Jonathan Farmer, math teacher and Interact club adviser at A.L. Brown High School, the subdivision on Grants Crossing Lane in Spencer could have been another statistic of the bad economy.
Farmer, along with 14 students, three other teachers and wife Miranda, teamed with three Catawba College students and one from Rowan-Cabarrus Community College to help change that.
The new homes that now line the cul-de-sac will provide homes for local families, thanks to local volunteers and Habitat for Humanity.
Saturday, while the college student volunteers helped measure and hang vinyl siding on one house, Interact members from A.L. Brown painted walls and an outbuilding, and helped clean the yards around newly-built homes.
"We're all supposed to help each other," Farmer said. This is his first year as adviser of the Interact club, the high-school auxiliary of Rotary.
Farmer said the club is thriving thanks to community partnerships.
Kannapolis City Schools Superintendent Pam Cain is one of several school officials who are Rotarians.
And Kannapolis Rotary hosts a golf tournament annually to raise money for scholarships to help send A.L. Brown graduates to college.
Farmer said the students willingly stepped up to help out, despite a busy week of activities that just ended and a holiday week ahead.
"The kids have been awesome. They're not afraid to do anything," said Kelly Clark, a special education teacher who also teaches math classes for the school's Alternative Learning Center.
Jessica Rojas, an A.L. Brown senior who was just elected president of Interact, said she was glad to take part.
"It feels good to know that we're helping out, that even though we're students we can still help construct a house," Rojas said.
Rojas, a senior who plans to attend N.C. State University and pursue a degree in psychology, recently attended a month of meetings at the Kannapolis Rotary Club as a Junior Rotarian.
Jamie Beaver, junior class representative for Interact, said she feels being active in volunteer work will help her run her own business in the future.
"It's like a warm feeling inside, knowing that you're helping someone with their future house," Beaver said.
LaKeindra Snowden, who teaches business law and principles of business at A.L. Brown, said she was proud of the students who cheered at Friday's ball game, then turned out at 8 a.m. the next morning to volunteer.
"They're the future leaders," Snowden said. "They gave up whatever they do on Saturday mornings to give back."
Across one front yard, A.L. Brown junior Adriana Jaimez stood next to a future homeowner, Luis Perez.
Perez, originally from Puerto Rico, now works in Salisbury.
He is counting the days until December 17, when he, his wife, and their son and daughter will move into their new home.
Perez, Jaimez and some other bilingual students chatted in Spanish during their lunch break.
He spoke happily of how it would feel for his family to have a home of their own.
"I give thanks to God because He has blessed me so much," Perez said.
At the same time, he joked with the high school students who, while painting his new house, also managed to paint themselves pretty thoroughly.
"They gave three coats," Perez joked. "One to the wall, one to the clothes and one to the floor!"
On a serious note, Jaimez said the fact that people had helped her parents on their path to citizenship made her even more willing to give back.
Her parents immigrated to the U.S. from Michoac?n, Mexico. She was born here.
"I didn't get to help my parents, so I feel like I can help someone else at least," said Jaimez, who plans to pursue a career as a dental hygienist.
Two houses down, Nate Hill - a freshman at Catawba College and graduate of Carson High - helped measure and cut siding, which other volunteers and Habitat workers were hanging.
"As my work study (assignment), I am volunteer coordinator for this project," Hill said.
Working for Volunteer Catawba, he helps organize students who, in turn, are placed with Habitat for Humanity, Rowan Helping Ministries and other local organizations."The people who run Habitat out here ... are excellent teachers. They're literally teaching us how to build a house," Hill said.
Trey Ingram, a Catawba College junior and outside linebacker for the school's football team, said that it was good to be able to help give a family a new home.
"Especially when it's coming around to the time when families get together," Ingram said.
His teammate Dalton Pierce, also a junior at Catawba, said the hardest part wasn't the work, but learning the tricks of the trade and how to build a house right.
For RCCC student Miguel Hernandez, who is studying industrial engineering, past experience in the construction business made him eager to volunteer.
His hope for the family that will soon move into the house: "That this will be a good start for them, a brand new start, in case they've been in a bad situation."
And, for the students, Saturday's work with Habitat was an early start to the best kind of holiday giving there is.
Contact Hugh Fisher via the editor's desk at 704-797-4244.
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Source: http://www.salisburypost.com/News/111912-habitat-for-humanity
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