Wake Forest students to help Gulf Coast hurricane victims during holiday break
Twenty-one Wake Forest University students will spend a portion of their holiday break living out the spirit of Wake Forest’s motto “Pro Humanitate” (for humanity) by helping Hurricane Katrina victims in the Pascagoula, Miss., area.
The trip, sponsored by the Wake Forest Catholic Community, will take place from Jan. 2 through Jan. 9.
Students will stay in a retreat center in Mobile, Ala., and travel back and forth to the Pascagoula area, where they will be building storage buildings at St. Peter the Apostle Catholic School, participating in activities for children and completing other tasks as needed. The students will assist Catholic Social Services by bringing relief supplies each day from Mobile to Pascagoula.
St. Peter the Apostle Catholic School was heavily damaged by the hurricane. It was featured in a television news story on NBC. According to the story, the school and the families of its students were among the hardest hit by the storm. The school largely serves black families in the area.
Coincidentally, the school’s children in 2002 prepared gifts for the Wake Forest Catholic Community to deliver to people in Costa Rica. In recent years, the Wake Forest Catholic Community had sponsored Christmas season trips to that country, but this year students chose to travel to Mississippi, instead.
