In 2023, Chloe Rowan (CAS’25) (left) and Ari Burns (CAS’25) went on an ASB trip to Hobe Sound, Fla. The group worked to destroy invasive weeds at the Nature Conservancy at Blowing Rocks Preserve. Photo by Cydney Scott

Alternative Service Breaks

Alternative Service Breaks Program Returns in Full Swing for 2025

This week, student volunteers travel west and south to perform community service

Excitement was in the air as BU students wrapped up their midterms and began packing for spring break, especially those traveling as part of Boston University’s Alternative Service Breaks (ASB) program.

Hosted by the Community Service Center (CSC), ASB has for decades sent students to a variety of locations across the country on service-oriented trips. This year, dozens of Terriers will head out to four locations: Moncure, N.C., New Orleans, La., Macon, Ga., and Shawnee, Ill. While equally focused on community service, each trip plays to different interests students might have.

In Moncure, N.C., students will volunteer at Camp Royall, the country’s oldest and largest camp for people with autism. Those volunteering on this trip will help campers write and edit their résumés, apply to college, and submit applications for scholarships, as well as sharing their own college experiences with the hope of inspiring the next generation. 

The trip to New Orleans is the perfect opportunity for animal lovers, as the students will be volunteering there with the Louisiana Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, performing upkeep in and around the shelter (think unsexy tasks like restocking the food pantry, weeding, and cleaning). The reward once they’re done? Playing and cuddling with the shelter’s animals. 

The students traveling to Macon, Ga., will be working with a nonprofit called Rebuilding Macon, which recruits volunteers to work rehabilitating homes for local senior citizens, as well as with members of the community with disabilities or who live below the poverty line. 

Shawnee, Ill., the location of ASB’s fourth trip, is a strong choice for outdoorsy or environment-minded students. Volunteers here will work at the Shawnee National Forest, helping to revitalize its walking trails, woodlands, and hills. 

In the video above, hear from Vanessa Ansong (CAS’26) about her experience on last year’s Alternative Service Break trip.

Orpheo Speer, CSC director, says the ASB program stresses community-informed and community-engaged service. This means that the organizers make sure that students work with approved long-term nonprofit partners whose work has been verified and addresses a community need.

“These service trips help inform the students about the challenges communities around the country are facing,” Speer says. “The country is in a divisive place right now, and these trips make our students more informed citizens. The trips build empathy and help students realize what others’ needs are. They hear the personal stories of the folks they are serving alongside, and that really helps build a common ground of understanding.” 

With a program as far-reaching as ASB, the CSC relies heavily on student leaders and coordinators, who are divided evenly among the four trips. One of them is Earth and environment major Shelby Rose Long (CAS’27), a student coordinator on the Moncure trip, who will oversee the volunteers and participate in Camp Royall’s professional skill-building activities.

“There’s a day where we’re going to a coffee shop and [serve] as baristas for a day, to work on job skills,” Long says. “There are also cooking classes, workout classes, and normal camp things like bonfires and hayrides.”

Long has been involved with the CSC since she arrived on campus as a freshman, beginning with her participation in the First-Year Student Outreach Project (FYSOP). The project gives incoming Terriers the opportunity to participate in local community service efforts across Boston while becoming familiar with their new surroundings. 

That freshman year spring, Long traveled to Georgia with the ASB program, where she and other students worked with the nonprofit Rebuilding Macon, forming invaluable memories, she says. “I grew up woodworking with my dad, and so the idea of using a saw after two months of sitting in lecture halls was very fun to me,” Long says. “I got to work with my hands, and get dirty and muddy and jump in a lake.” 

Although registration for this year’s ASB program is closed—Long and her fellow student coordinators and volunteers flew to their destinations this past weekend—the CSC hosts a variety of programs throughout the academic year, including Student Food Rescue and Days of Service, which Long cites as a great way for students to “get involved with community service without overloading their schedule with commitments.”

For those heading out on an ASB trip for the first time this spring break and feeling nervous, Long’s advice: “Don’t be in your own bubble, fully commit to it. Enjoy the company that you’re going to have, because you can make some really good, lasting friendships from it.”