Telluride students live in service project

By Tara D. Sharma

Daily Staff Reporter

This year 20 University students will eat, sleep and live their community service project as members of the newly formed Michigan Branch Telluride Association.

The undergraduates and graduates, who live in a house at 1735 Washtenaw Avenue, will spend the year working on a project at Dicken Elementary School in Ann Arbor that will investigate the importance of fine arts in education. The group chose the topic in response to 1995 cuts in arts funding in the Ann Arbor Public Schools.

"The Ann Arbor school district cut funding for a lot of arts teaching. Kids aren't getting the same exposure," said Telluride resident Sarah Nelson, an LSA junior.

Telluride resident Brian Debauch, an LSA senior, said members recruit artists to teach at the elementary school.

"Our job will be to help facilitate the program the guest artist has in mind," he said.

At Telluride House, members discuss their project over dinner and with guest speakers in an effort to learn interactively.

"Twenty hours of random service may be enriching to the individuals, but it doesn't enrich the group or bring them together like this project," said Thomas Hawks, program director of the Michigan Branch.

In order to choose their project and the rules of the house, students voted earlier this fall.

Last year six students were involved with the association as part of the pilot branch. The students spent the year volunteering as English tutors with Washtenaw Literacy.

The group has grown larger this year as a result of recruiting through programs such as Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program and the LSA Honors Program, Hawks said.

The students can spend every year they are at the University with the association once they are accepted.

Students in the program receive free room and board as members of the house.

"As long as students fulfill the terms of the scholarship, they are renewed. There are standards that need to be maintained," Hawks said.

The program is funded by the Telluride Association, a national non-profit organization founded in 1911 by L.L. Nunn, an industrialist-turned-philanthropist.

The Telluride Association has supported similar houses at other universities, including Cornell University. The branch at the University is distinguished from others by the presence of the yearlong project.

In future years, Debauch said, students may address issues such as voting patterns and participation, the environment and hunger through their projects.

There will be an open house in the beginning of next month for all students interested in participating in the program next year. The group's Website, www.umich.edu/~tellride, will have the time and location posted soon.