Page 132 - YB1969

Student Opportunities Service Christmas means many things to many people, but for SOS volunteers it has special significance: fruit cakes stuffed under the bed, in closets, and stacked in corners. The annual fund-raising project was supplemented this year by sponsorship of popcorn-hot dog-soda concessions at home sports events. But the contributions which SOS makes are not pri- marily monetary. SOS takes the whole soul, the whole body and devotes it to a group receptive to help. During the year, books were collected and catalogued to be used in establishing libraries in under-privileged areas. Presen- tations informed civic organizations of summer projects of various field teams. Included for the first time was a venture to a less well- known poverty area: the Oklahoma Indian Reservation. Installment of a library was the focal point there, in addi- tion to tutoring school children, and establishing a per- manent problem-solving committee. Teams returned to existing projects in Appalachia and Puerto Rico gratified to see that much of the previous year's work still remained. A special delight to Appalachia volunteers was a four- teen-day visit from Christian Bayley, a banjo-plinking West Virginian. Staying at an apartment in Vetville, he enter- tained and was entertained by Western Maryland students who stopped in to set, sing, and spin yarns. Students who left for their summer projects after orien- tation at Western Maryland returned to school filled with graphic memories of summer with a meaning. 128