This past Saturday I attended the community service event down in Stewart Park where we helped build a new playground. The entire project was done with the help of volunteers in the greater Ithaca community over the course of approximately a week, with twelve hours of work everyday. I really enjoyed the experience for a lot of reasons, beyond the fact that it’s always nice to contribute to a project like this.

One of my biggest takeaways was how important management is to the “flow” of a project. I’ve volunteered for a handful of projects like this, only they were always on a much smaller scale. The sheer amount of volunteers for this project was staggering, and it was clear that at times it was difficult for the project managers to keep everyone occupied with a job. There were only three people as far as I can tell that knew all the detailed plans for the project, and beyond that everyone was waiting for instruction. Because of this, there were definitely a lot of times I felt a little bit directionless. Not to undermine all of the incredibly hard work that was put in, but I can’t help but wonder if it would’ve been more efficient if there were more project managers on site that knew what needed to be done and how.

The other thing that I took away from this was just how little I know about power tools. I’m definitely comfortable using a drill, but when it comes to things like circular saws I have next to no experience. At first I was nervous to ask for help, but the fear of hurting myself with the tool quickly outweighed that nervousness. Life lesson: never be afraid to ask for help if you need it! All in all, this was an extremely rewarding experience, and I hope to attend more like this with Rose House.