Center for Work and Service Has Worked with Habitat for Humanity Since Hurricane Katrina

During the last week of Wintersession, a group of 17 Wellesley students (including one senior, three juniors, four sophomores, and nine first-years) and three staff members traveled to New Orleans for the Center for Work and Service’s (CWS) seventh annual Habitat for Humanity service trip. 

Wellesley has been traveling to New Orleans since the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005. This year the group is working at multiple houses in the Hoffman Triangle neighborhood.

Students applied to go on the trip through the CWS. It was a competitive application process in which student submitted an essay explaining their interest in Habitat for Humanity’s re-building efforts in New Orleans. The majority of the costs for the trip are funded by the CWS.

One of the group leaders was CWS Program Director for Service Katie Koski. Koski joins the Center for Work and Service (CWS) from Northeastern University where she served as an internship coordinator in the Human Service Program. Prior to Northeastern, Katie was the assistant director of Harvard University’s Center for Public Interest Careers and Public Service Network. Katie has also worked at nonprofits such as Teach for America, City Year, and the Coro Fellows Program in Pubic Affairs. Katie received her Ed.M. with a higher education concentration from Harvard’s Graduate School of Education and her undergraduate degree from Central Michigan University in interpersonal and public communication with a minor in public affairs.

Pictured are Victoria Rines '15, Katie Donlan '16, Katie Koski, Elizabeth Olson '16, Chandler Abshire '16, and Amanda Gaynor '13.