This Saturday, go to the Zoo to get your community service hours. For your three hours of service, you get lunch and a free pass to the Zoo.

It’s from 10:30 to 1:30. See the permission slip and information below.

The easiest and most fun way to get your community service hours is by joining buildOn. We meet on Tuesdays at Lunch in Room 300.

Click below to see the September Community Service Opportunities.

Now buildOn is on an MSNBC blog! Check out this article!

A foundation, for a school and for life

SOUNKALA, Mali – “To educate a girl is to educate a thousand people,” says Maimouna Samaké, a mother of six (including five girls). “If you put one seed of millet in the ground and rain comes, it grows and gives many seeds.”

And now Samaké, one of 2,000 residents in this small village in one of the world’s poorest countries, has a chance to see this prediction come true thanks to buildOn, an American non-profit organization that is building a school in her community.

Chemene Pelzer/ NBC News

Maimouna Samaké and her five daughters.

For 17 years, buildOn has been sending American high school students overseas to create schools in places where literacy and formal education are usually out of reach. The organization, which has built about 300 schools in Mali, Malawi, Nepal, Senegal, Nicaragua and Haiti, says its goal is to empower young Americans in mostly urban areas to get involved in their own communities while at the same time bringing literacy to children and adults in the developing world.

And with only about 70 children enrolled in Sounkala’s current make-shift school, where mud floors, inadequate lighting, few desks and an absence of books make for a less than ideal learning environment, they certainly could use buildOn’s help.

As a producer for the Today Show, I went along to Sounkala to see how one of buildOn’s projects comes together. Click here to see more.

Here’s the second and final segment about buildOn on the Today Show. Come to our meetings on Tuesdays at lunch in Room 317 to find fun and easy community service opportunities!

Want a fun way to get 4 hours of community service this Saturday, February 28? Meet us at ISA this Saturday at 11:45. There will be about 15 students from buildOn there. Then we’ll walk to the Food Bank, where you’ll get a free lunch before you start doing service. Print out the flier and required permission slip! (The permission slip is required.)

The last few weeks, we’ve seen strong growth in LHS’s chapter of buildOn. We now have 15 consistent members. Special congratulations to the ninth graders, who are showing their spirit and commitment.

buildOn is getting national coverage, with a two-part series on the Today Show. Take a look at the first part!

This Saturday, meet at the SF Zoo at 8 a.m. to get community service through buildOn. You can get three hours of service plus you get food and a free pass to the zoo in the afternoon. Check it out by clicking here.

(Don’t get near the tigers. To the left is Tatiana.)

Trek for Knowledge 2008 was a huge success! Congratulations to Nayda Peace and Jesus Sandoval for helping to build a school in Kongolikoro, Mali. Ask them about it! Here are some pictures.