By SHANNON O. WELLS
It’s still challenging to come up with many positive things that resulted from the COVID pandemic lockdown period, but at Pitt, the downtime and uncertainty resulted in at least one vibrant new campus event.
As Gabrielle DeMarchi, assistant director of Pitt Community Affairs, tells it, Civic Action Week emerged from the 2020 doldrums of COVID, initially as a series of online educational and engagement events.
“During the pandemic, the planning team was looking to re-imagine what service and community engagement looked like, with a more robust and connected week of opportunities being offered,” she said. “Thus, Civic Action Week (was) born. Today, it’s a week-long series of workshops, speakers and in-person service opportunities surrounding a unique theme each year.”
Organized by Pitt’s Office of Engagement and Community Affairs and Pitt Serves, the campus-wide event gives students, faculty, staff and the broader community an opportunity to “educate, engage and encourage collective responses to pressing social issues.”
The fourth-annual Civic Action Week takes place Oct. 16-21.
DeMarchi said this year’s theme, “Rewriting our Future: Activism Through Storytelling,” reflects the idea that “oral and written traditions allow us to look back and honor the past across cultures and identities as well as look forward to forge new trails,” she said. “Those same traditions bring together communities to unite around today’s demands for social change and hopes for the future.”
While people outside Pitt are welcome to take part in any of the workshops or speakers throughout the week, Pitt students and alums are particularly encouraged to volunteer and serve for Civic Action Week’s Days of Service on Oct. 20 and 21.
“The first day (Oct. 20) is for everyone, with an emphasis on faculty and staff,” explained Natalie Jellison, Pitt outreach coordinator, noting that Pitt employees can take advantage of 7.5 paid hours each month to volunteer, “thus the volunteer opportunities during ‘normal business hours.’
“The second day has an emphasis on students,” she added. “For a few hours, students will go into the community and volunteer alongside community residents on a plethora of community-based projects.”
Pitt United Way will host two separate events for Civic Action Week: a virtual Racial Wealth Gap simulation designed to challenge assumptions and stimulate discussion of how past policies and practices continue to have real world consequences in the community, while the “Poverty Spiral, Kit Packing, and Collection Drive” event is meant to give participants a deeper understanding of how area families struggle to meet basic needs.
“They will then pack weekend food kits for local students, as well as collect household cleaning supplies such as floor cleaner, Clorox wipes, bathroom cleaning supplies, paper towels and baby diapers and wipes to be distributed,” DeMarchi said.
Other event highlights include a round table discussion with Mayor Ed Gainey and Pitt student athletes at 1 p.m. Oct. 17, moderated by Ron Idoko, associate director of the Center on Race and Social Problems. The discussion will focus on diversity and inclusion and how student athletes can use their platforms to make a difference.
For more information about event workshops or service projects, visit caw.pitt.edu.
To help gauge the overall level of civic engagement among Pitt staff and faculty, the Community Affairs team uses the volunteer portal as a tool. Faculty and staff are encouraged to log their hours via Pitt Worx.
“When it comes to staff volunteerism, we saw a large amount of participation in fiscal year 2020, with 700 staff members engaging in volunteerism, dedicating 2,865 hours,” DeMarchi said. “We then saw a dip the past couple of years, but for fiscal year 2023, we saw a resurgence of 800 staff members engaging in volunteerism, dedicating 2,253 hours.”
Registration for Oct. 20 and 21 service projects closes on Oct. 13, and workshop registrations close 24 hours before the event.
Planning for the Civic Action Week started back in April, and DeMarchi said it’s inspiring to be on the verge of the event.
“I think we are all excited for Civic Action Week to really help us kick off the academic year of service opportunities our two offices can provide for the entire Pitt community,” she said. “(We) look forward to the coming months of connecting Pitt community members to our wonderful local and regional partners.”
Jellison concurred. “We hope it continues to grow and get more folks in the Pitt Community involved,” she said.
Shannon O. Wells is a writer for the University Times. Reach him at shannonw@pitt.edu.
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