#MRO17 Re­cap

With over 1,600 vol­un­teers and over 100 or­ga­ni­za­tions, #MRO17 was the largest to date.

Maryville Reaches Out, also known as MRO, is an an­nual event, a day when all stu­dents, fac­ulty, staff and alumni are en­cour­aged to share their time and tal­ent in com­mu­nity ser­vices.

“We look at MRO as build­ing com­mu­nity out­side of Maryville, but also build in­side of our own com­mu­nity,” states Dean of Stu­dents Kathy Quinn. “It is an op­por­tu­nity to build and strengthen re­la­tion­ships; to strengthen with peo­ple you know or have known and en­hanc­ing that ‘One Team, One Fam­ily.’”

Be­low are three in­ter­views with MRO team lead­ers dis­cussing their #MRO17 pro­jects and ex­pe­ri­ences.

An­drea Fandino, se­nior strate­gic com­mu­ni­ca­tion ma­jor

Pro­ject: House Rab­bit So­ci­ety of Mis­souri

About the Pro­ject: Mis­souri House Rab­bit So­ci­ety (HRSMO) is a na­tional non­profit or­ga­ni­za­tion that is known for vol­un­teers pro­vid­ing ap­pro­pri­ate care and so­cial­iza­tion op­por­tu­ni­ties to rab­bits so they may be adopted into lov­ing, per­ma­nent and in­door homes.

Tell me about your ex­pe­ri­ence.

“We started off by clean­ing the cages, chang­ing their stool box with new food and wa­ter. Then, we di­vided into teams that swept, put food back in or­der and cleaned win­dows. We stayed un­til 2:30 p.m. We did not stop for lunch be­cause we wanted to keep par­tic­i­pat­ing and get done as much as we could for the or­ga­ni­za­tion. We all col­lab­o­rated as a team and at the end of the pro­ject, we could see the dif­fer­ence from when we started.”

How were the rab­bits?

“They [rab­bits] were su­per cute. How­ever, there were some that we could not touch be­cause they would bite. Most of the rab­bits are ei­ther res­cued or come from more ag­gres­sive back­grounds which made them not like cer­tain things. Most rab­bits had bios next to cages that said ‘I bite.’”

What did you get out of your ex­pe­ri­ence?

“Some­times we are not aware of the dif­fer­ent or­ga­ni­za­tions that are try­ing to peo­ple, an­i­mals, or the en­vi­ron­ment. There are so many smaller or­ga­ni­za­tions like this [HRSMO] that are putting a lot of ef­fort into mak­ing a dif­fer­ence which is so amaz­ing be­cause they do not have much sup­port nor as many peo­ple like big­ger or­ga­ni­za­tions.”

Kirby Cooper, sopho­more his­tory ma­jor

Pro­ject: LaSalle Mid­dle School

About the Or­ga­ni­za­tion: LaSalle Mid­dle School is a pub­lic char­ter school lo­cated in North St. Louis that is com­mit­ted to trans­form­ing chil­dren and the com­mu­nity through in­no­v­a­tive ed­u­ca­tion.

How was your time be­ing a leader?

“I re­ally en­joyed my time as a leader be­cause I liked the re­spon­si­bil­ity. It got me to break out of my shell a bit. I’m nat­u­rally a quiet per­son, how­ever this forced me to reach out to com­plete strangers, in­clud­ing stu­dents and staff.”

What did you get out of your ex­pe­ri­ence? 

“Even though the work was tough and the kids were re­ally en­er­gized, I re­ally en­joyed spend­ing the day at the mid­dle school be­cause some of the stu­dents are not in the best liv­ing sit­u­a­tions. I felt em­pow­ered just be­ing able to spend some time with them.”

Krista Koors, se­nior cy­ber se­cu­rity ma­jor

Pro­ject: So­ci­ety of St. Vin­cent De­Paul

About the Or­ga­ni­za­tion: So­ci­ety of St. Vin­cent de Paul are men and women who strive to grow spir­i­tu­ally by of­fer­ing per­son-to-per­son ser­vice to in­di­vid­u­als in need.

Why did you de­cide to be­come an MRO leader?

“I have al­ways been pas­sion­ate about lead­er­ship po­si­tions. I’ve held a lead­er­ship po­si­tion on cam­pus since my first month of be­ing a fresh­man. I love or­ga­niz­ing and hav­ing to not re­port to peo­ple. Hav­ing the free­dom to or­ga­nize things and be­ing a per­fec­tion­ist, I have the au­thor­ity to say, ‘I want it this way.’ Also, some­one has to do it so I wanted to step up and be that per­son.”

Tell me about your in­ter­ests in the or­ga­ni­za­tion.

“I’ve shopped at the St. Vin­cent De­Paul thrift store. I like go­ing there be­cause they have a com­bi­na­tion of nice peo­ple that work there and sales go to­wards causes. Also, it’s cool to see what all they bring in and there are some valu­able things that peo­ple bring in know­ing that it will ben­e­fit some­one else.”

Let us know your fa­vorite ex­pe­ri­ence/​mem­ory from MRO in the com­ments be­low!