Beyond-The-Classroom Community-Engaged Learning: Fall Spartan Day of Service
A group of Fall Day of Service volunteers with Allen Neighborhood Center walking and connecting as they return for lunch. Several have bags and grabbers for picking up trash, and one wears a bright yellow safety vest for distributing flyers in the neighborhood
By: K.C. Keyton
On October 4, the Center for Community Engaged Learning and MSU Alumni hosted our annual Fall Spartan Day of Service. 401 student volunteers teamed up with our community partners at 13 sites in Greater Lansing and two sites in Detroit.
This event’s kickoff rally included the 2026 MSU Homecoming Court and special guest speaker James Hintz, Ph.D., vice president for Student Affairs. In addition, CCEL launched an abridged version of our community-engaged learning orientation to encourage volunteers to think about their service in the broader context of social change and the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Collectively, Fall Day of Service volunteers served 2,406 hours on a variety of projects, including home repairs for families recovering from disaster and groundskeeping for local parks and natural areas. Based on the hourly value of volunteer time in Michigan calculated by Independent Sector, Day of Service volunteers generated $79,085 of equivalent financial impact in communities served.
Fall Day of Service volunteers with the MSU Pollinator Gardens planting Michigan native plant species by the Red Cedar River
“We rely on groups like [Spartans] who are enthusiastic and want to be a part of the community to be able to reach a high volume of neighbors, which is a huge boon for a staff of eight people,” says Allen Neighborhood Center volunteer and communications manager Ethan Schmitt. Allen Neighborhood Center volunteers distributed flyers about community events and resources, picked up litter around the neighborhood, and worked in the center’s urban garden. “We know that, not only is it going to be a cleaner neighborhood, but also people are going to know more about us and the resources we provide,” Schmitt says.
Partners for this Day of Service also included After the Storm; Eastside Community Action Center; Edgewood Village Housing Nonprofit; the Equine Center for Learning; Fenner Nature Center; the MSU Pollinator Gardens; Potter Park Zoo; South Lansing Urban Gardens; the MSU-Detroit Partnership for Food, Learning, and Innovation; and Rescue Nature Now. Thank you to our community partners for welcoming our students and to our student volunteers for giving their time to make a difference!
