More often than not the most difficult thing about having a dream and a passion isn’t knowing what you want to do, but knowing exactly how to execute it. It is way too easy to become overwhelmed with all of the details, especially when it may feel like you are the only one who cares. The recent event, Passion to Action: Student Changemakers, provided much needed answers to students with these problems. Passion to Action, hosted and organized by the Center for Civic Engagement (CCE) on March 21, 2016, aimed at facilitating a conversation among students about how to become engaged with their community and create a change for the issues they care about. This event, though important in and of itself, also embodies a larger problem within the Binghamton community. The problem being the chasm between Binghamton University and the greater Binghamton area. But this divide is not insurmountable. Many students are willing and able to get engaged in the community, but simply don’t know where to start. Although this event wasn’t as highly attended as it should be, it was met with a lot of enthusiasm. This proves not the lack of students willing to get involved, but the lack of information on smaller events like this being widely accessible to all students.
Sure we have B-Line, but the list of events and club meetings is so long that, if I’m being honest, it almost always goes straight to my trash. When push comes to shove, the way that events are advertised on campus and students are encouraged to attend is mostly word of mouth. You go to an event if your friend is going, and that is about it. This is unfortunate because there are so many different things happening on campus that could have such better attendance rates if only students knew that these events were happening. Passion to Action is an example of a larger campus-wide epidemic. Binghamton students don’t lack passion, that much is clear. What we do lack is a way to effectively follow through and get involved in the things that interest us.
The first hour of Passion to Action consisted of a panel discussion where three BU students ⎯ one alumni and two current students ⎯ described how they each worked hard to make their own dream a reality. The panelists were Clare Gilroy ‘16, Founder of Homeless Night Out; Conrad Taylor ‘18, District Four Binghamton City Councilman; and Natalie Hughes ‘12, Community Garden & Youth Program Manager of Volunteers Improving Neighborhood Environments (VINES). The panelists answered questions such as “How did you find solutions that are actually needed/make a difference?” and “What have you learned about your community through your community service work?” One of the most important questions addressed was about making sure that your solution addresses an actual need in the community, an issue that students often overlook.
The second hour consisted of a workshop where the students were broken up into three groups, one with each panelist. In these groups they discussed in more detail some of the ideas students had for how to get involved in the community and make a difference. Panelists addressed specific questions and brainstormed ideas with the students. A lot of the students had a passion and a dream, but they didn’t know how to reconcile the two. During the panel, Taylor described how he was elected to the Binghamton City Council. His words should be taken into account no matter what you are trying to do, whether your goal is to be elected to a government office as a teenager (Ben from Parks and Recreation, anyone?) or something on a smaller scale, like wanting to start your own club dedicated to water conservation. “It was sort of this mix between being someone to believe in in the community and being someone to believe in among students—that’s what brought this together and that’s how I ended up winning, with the students and the community coming together to elect this 19-year-old kid.”
Another really important gem came from Hughes, “Don’t be worried, if you don’t know what you’re passionate about, you’re going to find it, and it will click. You’ll go where the opportunities take you, and you’ll make a lot of change.” This advice, although seemingly simple, is important for a lot of students to hear. We spend so much time worrying about what we are going to do and wanting to make a difference that we forget to enjoy taking the time to figure it out. Hughes had never even heard of VINES before interning there, and now it has become her career. When you do find something you are passionate about, if you find a way to get involved, then things will fall into place. However, finding a way to get involved can be unnecessarily difficult. On a campus with hundreds of SA chartered clubs alone, the choice of where to get involved and where to steer clear is daunting. Variety isn’t always a good thing. If a student’s decision of where to get involved then stems from what clubs they have happened to hear about or where their friends want to join, they could very well be missing out on a club that would show them their true passion.
Perhaps it is time to consider a reworking of B-Line. Maybe some sort of survey could be sent at the beginning of each semester where a student checks off of a list the types of events and clubs they are interested in hearing about. And that way instead of a long list of clubs you don’t care about coming to clog up your email everyday, you get a personalized list that you actually want to read, and with events you will actually attend. This solution isn’t perfect, but at least it’s a start. It could be the first step on a bridge to better connect events to students and in turn connect students to the community. Events like Passion to Action that spark these relationships are too few and far between. Binghamton has a lot of great resources available to students who want to connect with the community, but more often than not students don’t recognize that these resources are available. Students who were lucky enough to hear about Passion to Action and who attended noted that they are excited by the prospect of giving back to the greater Binghamton community and were thrilled to find that the CCE is such an accessible resource through which to do so. I am personally looking forward to attending the next Passion to Action event, this Wednesday April 27th, 4-6 p.m. in UU206 and hope to see more events like this in the future!
For more info on this event check out the CCE’s Website!