{"id":4550,"date":"2016-01-31T10:36:45","date_gmt":"2016-01-31T18:36:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/?p=4550"},"modified":"2016-09-12T20:20:26","modified_gmt":"2016-09-13T03:20:26","slug":"pacifica-volunteers-in-silicon-valley-join-the-fourth-annual-multifaith-day-of-service","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/2016\/01\/31\/pacifica-volunteers-in-silicon-valley-join-the-fourth-annual-multifaith-day-of-service\/","title":{"rendered":"Pacifica Volunteers in Silicon Valley Joined the Fourth Annual Multifaith Day of Service"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hundreds of people gathered at locations across San Mateo County for an afternoon of volunteerism, to connect with others and to support local schools as part of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Peninsula Multifaith Coalition rallied more than 500 volunteers to visit nearly 25 locations as part of the fourth annual Multifaith Day of Service.<\/span><\/p>\n

From gathering clothes and books for needy children to serving lunch to shelter residents, hundreds of people opted to spend the holiday striving to promote the ideals King stood for by helping those in need.<\/span><\/p>\n

People from various faiths, parents, students and more gathered at the North Shoreview Elementary School Monday morning to support several worthy causes such as literacy programs and campus beautification projects. Putting aside differences and coming together for a common goal helps commemorate King\u2019s legacy in a tangible way, said Connie Winter-Eulberg, pastor of Saint Andrews Lutheran Church in San Mateo.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"IMG_3058\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is our big service day and we\u2019re gathering American Turkish Muslims (Pacifica Institute), Hindus, Buddhists, Jews and Christians and we\u2019re all gathering together,\u201d Winter-Eulberg said. \u201cWhen you think about all the violence that\u2019s happening in the world, when we\u2019re gathering together today, there\u2019s no fighting, there\u2019s no arguing. There is a lot of \u2018thank you very much,\u2019 \u2018so glad to meet you,\u2019 \u2018you\u2019re now one of my friends.\u2019 So this is how we bring peace to the world; doing stuff like this.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

From purchasing wood to build new benches for students to sit on, to revamping gardens with new plants, volunteers gave the local school some much needed tender love and care.<\/span><\/p>\n

Race, religion and age seemed irrelevant as a broad spectrum of people worked side by side.<\/span><\/p>\n

Christopher Vandrey, a Saint Andrews congregation member and the father of two sons who attend North Shoreview Elementary School, said he was happy to pass on a positive message to his boys.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just to kind of give these guys an idea about being invested in your school and learning volunteering. And there\u2019s also kind of a really positive MLK message,\u201d Vandrey said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Seven-year-old Warren Vandrey seemed to blissfully enjoy the morning outdoors helping to prune his school\u2019s planters and garden. When asked what he learned about King in school, Warren Vandrey had clearly retained a key message about the late reverend.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHe changed the world. And [taught] that white and black people should be treated equally,\u201d Warren Vandrey said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Parent Glenn Fukudome, a member of the school\u2019s Greens and Grounds Committee, said he was impressed to see how many people came to volunteer.\"DSC02228\"<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe amount of workforce we have here, there\u2019s a lot of equipment moving and a lot of tasks are being completed. It\u2019s pretty awesome,\u201d Fukudome said. \u201cTo give back to the community, it\u2019s just a wonderful event.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The day of service also provided a critical opportunity for some year-round support as literacy educators taught parents how to best support their children \u2014 a worthy cause in the primarily Hispanic neighborhood, said Winter-Eulberg and school Principal Phyllis Harrison.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere needs to be a little extra care and attention here. That\u2019s why we\u2019re doing the reading buddy program. So there are literacy educators from all along the Peninsula who are volunteering their time today in order to train our volunteers, for them to then teach parents how to teach their kids,\u201d Winter-Eulberg said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Harrison said she hopes some of those who joined to commemorate King will keep the spirit of volunteerism alive and help support the local elementary school and children who need extra support learning how to read.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been wonderful. We have so many different projects going on, we\u2019re really helping the students and their families because they\u2019re learning to read, to teach their children and different skills. The school\u2019s also getting beautified and the benches are being made,\u201d Harrison said. \u201cIt\u2019s just a wonderful community project and it really helps our school.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hundreds of people gathered at locations across San Mateo County for an afternoon of volunteerism, to connect with others and to support local schools as part of Martin Luther King Jr. Day. The Peninsula Multifaith Coalition rallied more than 500 volunteers to visit nearly 25 locations as part of the fourth annual Multifaith Day of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":4552,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[534,277,537,278],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4550","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community-service","category-recent-events","category-silicon-valley-branch","category-slideshow"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4550","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4550"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4550\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4554,"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4550\/revisions\/4554"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4552"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pacificainstitute.org\/bay-area\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}