And the gardening continues!

By: Amber Brookmire Amber is a graduating senior at the City College of New York, majoring in Anthropology and Jewish Studies. She is participating in the 2012 CCNY-InteRDom Service Learning Program, and will serve as the InteRDom Correspondent in the CUNY system. To read more about Amber and her participation in the Correspondent program, see her profile here. We have continued our gardening project this week in Bayona, an urban community neighboring Cielo. Most families do not have a space with soil to begin a garden, so we have shifted our approach to accommodate their situation. Rather than planting directly into the ground as we did in Cielo, we have created raised boxes within which... Read More

Who would have thought gardening is quite an adventure!

By: Amber Brookmire Amber is a graduating senior at the City College of New York, majoring in Anthropology and Jewish Studies. She is participating in the 2012 CCNY-InteRDom Service Learning Program, and will serve as the InteRDom Correspondent in the CUNY system. To read more about Amber and her participation in the Correspondent program, see her profile here. After spending two weeks working alongside the families of Cielo, we have successfully reached our gardening goals! Each day, we divided ourselves into two groups and headed into the depths of the village to meet a new family and to discover new plot of land. It was quite an adventure to reach some of these gardens. This... Read More

One Week, Many Good Experiences!

By: Amber Brookmire Amber is a graduating senior at the City College of New York, majoring in Anthropology and Jewish Studies. She is participating in the 2012 CCNY-InteRDom Service Learning Program, and will serve as the InteRDom Correspondent in the CUNY system. It is amazing how much I have seen and learned after spending only one week, in Santo Domingo. During the first few days we met our team of volunteers, learned to make “huertos” (small gardens) at the National Botanical Gardens and helped create organic compost at a university in Bonao. With my notebook and camera in hand, we boarded the big, white bus and headed for Cielo, the first community in which we... Read More

The Punta Cana Community

By: Anna Groesser Graduate and Gap Year 32-week Program, 2012 You can read about Anna's internship with Grupo PUNTACANA on the InteRDom website here. I’m now at the halfway point of my eight-month internship here in Punta Cana and there’s so much to talk about! For starters, I’d like to remark on the friendliness of most every employee I come in contact with on the hotel property. When I leave my casita in the morning and walk to the employee cafeteria, I probably pass on average about ten different employees, and it is extremely odd if even one does not look me in the eye and say hello or good morning. I am wearing my employee badge,... Read More

Category: community

Service Learning in Batey Libertad

By: Cynthia So Executive Director, Yspaniola Batey Libertad has seen its share of visitors. Youth from the batey are adept at using Facebook and have accumulated friends from across the world. Students are motivated to learn English, knowing they can practice their skills each time a group comes to visit. More importantly, over the years Batey Libertad has benefitted from community development projects that have provided colorful cement homes, latrines, better roads, community centers, potable water, and scholarships for education. Service-learning programs have provided mutual benefit for both groups visiting the batey, as well as for the community. Batey Libertad is unique in many ways, making it an ideal destination for travelers who wish to... Read More