Outreach

God’s love can be found anywhere, despite things like language barriers and difficult sites, that was the take away from multiple mission trips GCU students went on this summer. Students traveled all over the world to help serve and share their love for the lord with communities in need. “God is the same everywhere, and He doesn’t change whether you’re in the United States or in different countries,” junior Karli Burns said about her mission trip to Costa Rica. “It was worth it because it just showed me how much God’s love is universal.”

It was after a rash of drownings in the early 2000s that GCU basketball great Ray Arvizu and the late Robert Ortiz came up with an idea to organize Niños Seguros, with the focus being on keeping children safe. That back-to-school and safety fair, now in its 15th year, returned to GCU on Saturday. About 1,500 to 2,000 west Phoenix students picked up backpacks and school supplies, received basic health screenings, including from the University’s nursing students and staff, and joined in the community celebration that also featured vocalists and ballet folklórico dancers. “We have great Hispanic families and great entrepreneurs. We’re proud of our Hispanic heritage. We’re proud of our schools. … At the end of the day, we’re just trying to make it better,” Arvizu said of the community-building and culture-rich event.

Through four different trips this summer, 79 Honors College students benefited from some eye-opening experiences in 13 different countries in Europe, Central America and Southeast Asia. “You can see that these students start to think on a global perspective,” Program Manager Dennis Williams said. “They start to think about the world as a whole and start to think about ways that, whatever it is that they do, how they can have an impact in their local community in whatever way, in our nation but even globally.”

An estimated 5,000 Title I elementary schoolchildren are weaving their way this week through the Lopes Performance Center, which has been turned into a unique department store. It’s where those kindergarten through sixth graders, all preselected and preregistered by their schools, are loading up on polo shirts, shoes, socks, belts, books, school supplies and more as part of the four-day Back to School Clothing Drive’s New Clothes, New Beginnings distribution event. GCU was there in full force on Monday for Lopes Day at the LPC. “We just love to be a part of these kinds of events,” said GCU Provost Dr. Hank Radda, “especially ones that focus on youth and K-12 education, because that’s very much a part of our Five-Point Plan.”

The first day of school: new clothes, new shoes, new backpack. But the same scenario doesn’t play out for every schoolchild, which is why the nonprofit Back to School Clothing Drive has made it its mission to provide new clothing, backpacks, school supplies and more to 5,000 students whose families live at or below the poverty level. Those students will be arriving on the Grand Canyon University campus Monday through July 25 for the Back to School Clothing Drive’s New Clothes, New Beginnings distribution event, and hundreds of volunteers are needed to help hand out shoes, clothing, backpacks and more. “It takes 300 volunteers to pull off one day, and I’d like to have 301,” Accomazzo said of Lopes volunteers.

GCU and GCE volunteers fanned out to two homes in the neighborhood on Friday, digging into painting and landscaping projects and defying the July heat. Homeowner Mira Nava recalled the first time Habitat visited her home eight years ago to fix the roof. Her mother was battling cancer at the time and told Nava: “This is a reminder that God is still here.” Andrea Northup, Habitat for Humanity Faith Relations Manager, told Nava: “That’s what GCU lives by — faith.”

When Brian Mucyo was 6, his parents had to send their son to a country more medically equipped to care for the deterioration of his vision. With only 10% visibility left in his left eye and a prosthetic eye for his right, Mucyo lived in Belgium for several years before moving to America to complete high school and eventually enroll at GCU. Now he’s an Honors College student and uses the skills he has developed in his travels (specifically, the four languages he now speaks fluently) to help other international students create the confidence to speak and learn English.

Tim Kelley never stops learning — that’s why he applied for a special summer program at the London School of Economics. But once program organizers saw how much the Assistant Professor for Entrepreneurship and Economics in the Colangelo College of Business knows about angel investing, he actually was asked to speak to the class about it. It’s another sign that GCU’s program is “right on target and on the cutting edge,” Kelley said.

“We’re the better neurons!” one student declared at GCU’s Biovision Day Camp after playing a few rounds of the Neuron Game. Sixth through ninth graders not only made like neurons but were wowed by the colors of light streaming through spectroscopes, gandered at 3D printers and more at the camp. It was just one of a quartet of STEM-savvy Thunder Vision offerings, with a different science and tech focus each day (Robovision, Ecovision and Cybervision among them) offered by the University’s K12 Educational Development. More than 500 students are attending the one-day camps, which wrap up today.

“Is this seaweed?” asked one second-grader on Tuesday morning at the new Learning Lounge at the Milwaukee Brewers’ baseball complex before diving into the other items nestled in a bucket before her: feathers, seashells, a crab leg. It was just one of the science activities that kept second- through fifth-graders busy at the Learning Lounge Science Camp. It’s one of two one-week camps at the new Brewers Learning Lounge, opened to expand GCU’s outreach into the community, which will be followed by two more one-week camps on the GCU campus Learning Lounge this June.