Quincy Native Julia Murphy Spending Spring Break Helping Others

2015 Mar 4

Quincy native Julia Rose Murphy will be traveling to California next week during Stonehill College's spring break as apart of its H.O.P.E. Service Immersion Program.

In Coachella Valley, California, Stonehill's HOPE group will be working with the Coachella Valley Housing Coalition to build affordable housing. The CVHC is a non-profit housing development corporation dedicated to helping low and very low-income families improve their living conditions through advocacy, research, construction, and operation of housing and community development projects. Participants will take part in indoor and outdoor construction. They will be able to learn about the area’s needs and challenges, as well experience the strong bond of community there. On the HOPE California trip, students will also be exposed to immigration issues and policy in America, and the injustices migrant farm workers face with pay and working conditions.

Students who participate in the H.O.P.E. program form community with one another during the five months leading up to their trip. They learn about the culture, history and issues of social injustice in the communities they are destined to visit and serve.

The trips themselves are truly immersive experiences, challenging students to engage the four tenets of H.O.P.E.:

• Honoring our neighbor
• Organizing for justice
• Practicing peace
• Encountering God

Upon their return, students are encouraged to reflect on their experiences and to integrate the pursuit of social justice into their day-to-day lives.

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Stonehill is a selective Catholic college located near Boston on a beautiful 384-acre campus in Easton, Massachusetts. With a student-faculty ratio of 13:1, the College engages over 2,500 students in 80+ rigorous academic programs in the liberal arts, sciences, and pre-professional fields. The Stonehill community helps students to develop the knowledge, skills, and character to meet their professional goals and to live lives of purpose and integrity.