26FALL STUDENT LIFE The Student Association partners with Canopy for a service project creating boxes for Afghan refugees. LOOKING IT OVER Seniors Ethan Brazell and Josh Shockley sit down in the George S. Benson Auditorium looking through the inventory of the boxes delivered to Canopy. This service project was held for a week and encouraged clubs to come together and pack boxes for those coming to Arkansas. Photo by: Jaxon Nash A PRAYER CHAIN WAS held on Aug. 25, 2021, for Afghanistan and the refugees who came to the United States. Following the prayer chain, University President David Burks and assistant professor of Bible and Director of the Mitchell Center Andrew Baker proposed a campus service project. The idea was passed to the Student Association (SA), who took charge of this project. “It was a quick turn around; it was within a week or five days that we had the idea,” SA Vice President Hannah Hackworth said. “The idea was executed, and then the idea was finished. We truly believe that it was through the power of prayer that the holy spirit placed it in Dr. Burks’ heart to do more than pray about it.” The SA connected with Canopy Northwest Arkansas, a non-profit organization for refugee resettlement that sent the SA a list of supplies needed for the refugee families. “What was deemed a good possibility after a conversation with the Governor’s office was to help Canopy, an organization that is the only resettlement organization in Arkansas,” Baker said. The goal was to send 50 boxes to Canopy for the refugees, and the student body exceeded that. Social clubs and organizations united to pack boxes full of bare necessities like bedding, soaps, towels, toothbrushes and toothpaste. To encourage schoolwide involvement, the SA added an aspect of competition for social clubs on who could bring in more boxes. Women’s social club Delta Gamma Rho won the competition, raising over $1,800 for the Canopy project. “People stepped up from clubs, individual groups and offices on campus,” Baker said. “Now they are delivering over 125 boxes to Canopy. The student body did great, and I am not surprised by that; they usually do.” Besides the numerical goal of 50 boxes, there was a goal of reaching beyond the Harding community to touch the lives of others. “For the event itself, I want refugees from Afghanistan to look at Harding University and see the face of God,” junior SA representative Malachi Brown said. “Whether they believe in Yahweh or Allah, I don’t care; I want them to be loved. The church as a whole is the representation of God to the world, and God’s love is not discriminatory. If nothing else, that is a conversation that can come out of this.” WRITTEN BY KAYLEIGH TRISTCHLER Rally Refugees for
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