Shalom Center to hold ice-cream social

The Shalom Community Center is holding a volunteer appreciation week at its home at the First United Methodist Church, 219 E. Fourth St. \nJunior Richa Sharma said a “starfish story” is the theme of this year’s event at the Shalom Community Center, located in the church.\nIn the story, a little boy paces up and down the beach throwing starfish into the ocean. The boy is approached by a man who questions why he is doing it. The man says there are so many washed up starfish that it is not possible for one boy to make a difference. The boy reaches down and throws another starfish into the ocean and replies, “I made a difference to that one.”\nThe Shalom Community Center is “a daytime resource center for people experiencing homelessness and poverty,” Volunteer Resource Coordinator Pam Kinnaman said.\nThe center will hold an ice-cream social April 26 from 2 to 4 p.m. to honor this year’s volunteers. They will receive starfish key chains that the guests – homeless people who stay temporarily in the shelter – made for them and mock paychecks that calculate their hours served and the value of their time.\nIU students make up more than 60 percent of volunteers at the center, Kinnaman said. Volunteer duties can be anything from greeting guests and handing out supplies to serving food and spending time with people who stop in to the center.\nSharma said she thought the theme she chose applied to other volunteers.\n“One or two hours of helping one person out is really making a difference to that person,” she said. “Help doesn’t always have to be on a grander scale.”\nSophomore Lydia Comer said she spends so much time at the center that she plans her class schedule around her volunteer time. “When I register for classes, I try to leave open a big chunk of time for volunteering,” Comer said.\nComer has been volunteering at the Shalom Community Center since August 2006. Through volunteering, she said she has learned to understand people who are different from her.\n“I feel that volunteering helps you to understand other people and teaches you not to be judgmental,” she said. “People have many unfair misconceptions about others, particularly about people living in homelessness or poverty.”\nSharma said she got involved at the center because of her experience with homelessness eight years ago, before her family moved from India to America.\n“I know what it’s like to not find a home the next day, and that’s why I wanted to help out,” she said. “Because I can really relate to what they’re going through.”\nKinnaman said it is hard to show appreciation to volunteers because there is always so much work to do at the center. She said the ice-cream social will give center employees and guests a chance to show their gratitude.\n“We want our volunteers to understand that they can make a difference with each of those individuals coming into Shalom,” she said. “Just as if they were the starfish.”