Seton Hall Students Give Back to South Orange

South Orange residents may have looked out their window on Saturday and noticed an odd sight;  Seton Hall students randomly looking at gas lamps.  This wasn’t some new curiosity of theirs, but rather a new initiative by the Village to have all 1,438 gas lamps in South Orange inspected by volunteers.

On Saturday, Seton Hall held the second of three Service on Saturday programs for the fall semester.  The program, started by the Seton Hall Division of Volunteer Efforts allows large group of students to donate their time and energy to projects. 

“I like coming out to S.O.S. because you meet a lot of the same people who have the same interests as you such as helping out the community,” said Chris Cashdan, a junior at Seton Hall.  “You make a lot of new friends.  It’s been a great time so far.”

South Orange Trustee Howard Levison took this opportunity to bring the students in to town to help.  The town was split on a map into 11 districts with a group of students taking one or two of them to inspect the condition of the gas lamps on each street and whether they were functioning. 

“We’ve always had an open need for community service for (the students),” said Levison. 

The students filled out a check list to decide whether each gas lamp was in good condition or needed attention.  The completed checklists will be sent to PSE&G so that they know which gas lamps require repairs.

“Trustee Levison deserves a lot of credit for putting this program together that will help us keep better track of the gas lamp outages,” said South Orange Village President Alex Torpey.  “Hopefully we can provide many more opportunities for the students to come down and help volunteer in town as well.”

The students were thankful for the opportunity to give back to the town as well.

“It’s perfect that we can have the opportunity to gave to the local neighborhood of South Orange,” said Clara Brunkhorst, a junior at Seton Hall.

Sophomore Erica Garcia, a member of Alpha Phi Omega, a national service fraternity, says she is always looking for opportunities to help.

“I just like meeting people who like giving back to the community and wanting to help, but just don’t know how to help,” said Garcia.  “Any little bit is something.”