Wu emphasizes CSER choices
Christian/Community Service offers opportunities to help local community
Service — Students reach out to kids at the Yoder Neighborhood Center. Photo credit: RJ Goodwin
Every academic year, thousands of students on Liberty’s campus invest in the community of Lynchburg, providing thousands of hours of service to a host of volunteer organizations.
Christian/Community Service (CSER) is a graduation requirement for all residential Liberty students. All four-year students must complete 20 hours of community service for six semesters, and transfers must complete 20 hours for every semester they attend Liberty.
“CSER provides opportunities for students to participate in helping the community and getting involved in ways that will benefit not only others, but also the students themselves in the future,” Darren Wu, Christian/Community Service coordinator and assistant professor in the school of religion, said.
CSER provides various opportunities for students to complete their service requirements, ranging from work in churches, the community, athletics and special projects approved by the CSER office.
“CSER allows students to get involved with community service that applies to their major or future job choices so that they can experience what that job may be one day,” Wu said. “(For example), I encourage education majors to volunteer at a local school and see firsthand the responsibilities that go along with being a teacher.”
CSER’s mission statement is based on the idea that faith without works is dead, as found in James 2:17. The statement says that “in fulfillment of the Great Commission of world evangelization found in Matt. 28:18-20, the Christian/Community Service component of the curriculum serves to affirm the Christian worldview and provide a practical expression of God’s love for mankind.”
CSER provides an opportunity for students to branch out and improve the overall well-being of the local community and its citizens. Wu emphasized the fact that many outgoing students realized the importance of CSER and what it did for them.
“We have had alumni give feedback that, although they may have seen this requirement as something of a burden, looking back, they have realized that CSER brought valuable experience to their lives, and by giving to others, they actually received a blessing themselves,” Wu said.
One recent CSER opportunity involved students serving at a memorial in downtown Lynchburg Sept. 13 in remembrance of 9/11.
Fifty students participated in the first annual 9/11 Memorial Stair Climb at the Bank of the James building on Main Street. The event honored the 343 New York City firefighters who lost their lives in the terror attacks Sept. 11, 2001.
“I was proud to be a participant of an event like this that could honor heroes of our country,” senior Libby Campbell, one of the students who participated in this effort, said. “Martin Misjuns definitely had a vision when he organized this effort that benefits the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation and the Central Virginia Burn Camp.”
For more information about how to get involved with CSER or to learn more about its benefits for students and the community, visit the CSER page on Liberty’s website, email them at CSER@liberty.edu, or visit Green Hall 1880.
FYI
The CSER add/drop deadline is Monday, Oct. 6.
JONES is a news reporter