Service Opportunities

Middle School Service Team: With meetings every Thursday from 2:45 to 4:45 pm in Br. Benjamin Hall, students have a chance to serve at local senior living centers near the St. John’s Prep campus. All are welcome to participate!

Bread & Roses: Students head to Bread & Roses, a soup kitchen in Lawrence, every other week to serve nutritious dinner meals and provide a clean and friendly facility for guests from the Merrimack Valley.

Putnam Farms: This assisted living community is designed for those who need a helping hand in their daily lives. It is a positive alternative for older adults who no longer wish to live alone or be burdened with the responsibility of coordinating in-home services. Students may also visit with residents of Homestead, a special unit for patients with memory loss.

Salem Boys & Girls Club: Students head to the Salem Boys and Girls club at the Collins Middle School to tutor and play with the children there (Students must complete a CORI check in order to participate in this volunteer program).

Xaverian Connection: Every Tuesday after school, students will walk down to the Xavier Center, fondly known as the Brother Barn, with a campus minister to spend quality time conversing, playing cards, and sharing stories with the retired Xaverian Brothers who live there

Named after the Xaverian Brother’s Founder Theodore James Ryken, In Ryken’s Footsteps is an opportunity for High School students to take part in service and cultural immersion trips in locations all across the globe. While some trips are as close as West Virginia or Philadelphia, others are as far away as Haiti or Ecuador. As students work on projects like home construction, preparing food, working in shelters, or mentoring youth, each trip provides a unique glance into the societal problems that plague different communities all over the world. Experiencing new perspectives through a specialized experiential learning opportunity, students find themselves in a position where they can critically examine societal consequences, and use such analysis as a spark for social advocacy and action.

Annual Service Trips

El Paso, Texas (February): St. John’s Prep will partner with Annunciation House’s Border Awareness Experience (BAE) in El Paso, TX. A trip to the border at El Paso and Ciudad Juarez offers students the opportunity to encounter and critically examine issues around America’s southern border. This would include opportunities to meet with migrants, border patrol, human rights activists, service providers, and maquiladora workers. Annunciation House also provides the added benefit of engaging border issues through a Catholic lens.

Phoenix, Arizona (February): The group from St. John's will travel to Phoenix, Arizona during February break from February 20 to 26, working with Network Volunteers, to minister to refugee families helping to set-up new homes, working in local shelters, mentor youth and help advocate for social justice initiatives.  Our students will have the opportunity to work on community projects, attend educational workshops related to immigration and participate in cultural activities. 

West Virginia (April): Traveling to Appalachia and staying at a local parish center, students experience the various world views, challenges, and realities that families and local communities face on a daily basis. Students roll up their sleeves to help with carpentry, home repair, and home construction over the course of the trip. We also make time to meet the families living in these homes and spend time with the local community.

Camden, New Jersey (April): This program takes students to the Camden neighborhood of New Jersey to serve through the Romero Center. This trip introduces students to the connection between Catholic social teaching and faith, and it provides a vivid example of simplicity and solidarity. Students will participate in a variety of service projects throughout the week. These service projects range from labor-oriented service (sorting, preparing, and serving food) to presence-oriented service (sharing stories with the very young and very old, and playing games at a community center).

Taking action to foster social justice is the focus of campus ministry programs. The Prep Urban Life Experience (PULSE) is just one of the ways in which students learn that they can make a difference. Unique to St. John’s Prep, the PULSE immersion program offers juniors a four-day opportunity to experience life in downtown Boston. Students work in soup kitchens, homeless shelters, inner-city grammar schools, and food banks. They also spend time with residents at the New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans and other locations in the Boston area. In addition, students visit the Boston Mobilization organization in Cambridge and the Capuchin Franciscan Friars in Jamaica Plain. In placing themselves in, for what is most, an unfamiliar environment, students find the opportunity to learn about communities of people they may have not otherwise been exposed to, while simultaneously serving the community and actively assisting marginalized communities.