Sending Students Into Service
Preparing students for leadership and service at Baylor means illustrating the importance of serving with full awareness of the needs of others.
Baylor’s Student Life leadership subscribes to the philosophy of learning by doing, providing scores of opportunities for students to transform theoretical knowledge into practical, real-life experiences. Service opportunities introduce students to a world that is bigger than themselves and to the ideas of community, leadership, stewardship, diversity, education, and faith.
Students from across the University are working and serving in their communities and around the world this summer. They are extraordinary ambassadors for Baylor.
Camp Counselors
Praying that students’ lights will shine bright as they embody the University’s enduring spirit of service, Baylor held an inaugural commissioning ceremony for 500-plus students who are serving as summer camp counselors.
“The ceremony served as an official send-off as we celebrated Baylor students serving at summer camps across the country,” Matt Burchett, BA ’01, director of student activities, said.
Fourteen summer camps were represented at the ceremony, including Kanakuk, a Christian summer camp in Missouri that has served more than 450,000 young people since 1926, Camp Ozark, a Christian summer camp in central Arkansas, and Pine Cove, a gospel-centered Christian camp founded in 1967 with locations in Texas and South Carolina.
Baylor graduate Reed Livesay, BBA ’96, president and CEO of Pine Cove, attended the ceremony, saying he has “never been prouder of Baylor” than he was that night.
“It was truly remarkable to see numerous educators there, including President Livingstone, taking time to pray over and encourage a group of young men and women who are about to embark on a summer of giving their lives away. Baylor University—valuing what matters most,” Livesay said.
Record Number of Mission Teams
Also this summer, Baylor Missions sent its largest contingent of mission teams ever—19 teams of 294 students, faculty, staff and alumni—to more than 10 countries and multiple domestic locations.
Teams went to England, Ghana, Guatemala, Italy, Kenya, Malaysia, Mexico, South Africa, Uganda and Zambia plus locations in Puerto Rico, Washington, D.C., and Dallas.
Through long-term global partnerships that foster servant-leadership and nurture students’ spiritual growth, Baylor student teams are giving their gifts and talents to serve others through the University by actively addressing health, community and leadership development, education, hunger, immigration and human trafficking, animal welfare and much more. Each team has a discipline-specific focus to its mission project, with students actively integrating their faith with service and learning.
Additional mission teams are scheduled this summer in India and Zambia (nursing), Guatemala (Line Camp experience), England (business) and the Rio Grande Valley (American Medical Student Association).