In the continuing efforts to seize upon interdisciplinary learning whenever possible, upper school students were offered the opportunity to volunteer alongside Dr. Mimi Doohan.

The ninth-graders’ reading of “Antigone” was part of their recent unit revolving around the issues of vulnerability and transience in the context of larger local, national and global community issues of homelessness, public health and street medicine.

In a special related assembly for grades 9 and 10 on Jan. 8, Doohan (M.D. Stanford; Ph.D. UCSB), a physician, public health advocate and champion of ‘street medicine,’ discussed her work in the field of public health, both locally and globally.

Clare Ogle ‘18 said, “I felt that it was an eye opening experience because it changed my perspective of people living in the street and helped me realize how truly vulnerable they are because they do not have health care.”

Doohan referred to, in particular, a few volunteer opportunities for students.

One of the local organizations Doohan works with is Common Ground Santa Barbara, which, in partnership with the Central Coast Collaborative on Homelessness, is always looking for assistance with Sock Drives.

This January the organizations were particularly looking for volunteers to help with their annual Vulnerability Index Survey and Point in Time Count of those whom they refer to as “street friends.”

Common Ground needed hundreds of tech-savvy volunteers to run the surveys in the early mornings of Jan. 28 and 29.

English teacher Ashley Tidey said, “The Laguna contribution to this important count and survey enterprise was so very powerful. Our community’s rallying together with the larger community was incredible. A service learning moment that will be a hard one to forget.”

Eleven upper-schoolers kindheartedly volunteered for the cause and were paired with either parent or teacher sponsors.

Common Ground accepted that students could only participate in one of the two mornings and, in exchange, worked at the shelter or Logistics Center for an additional few hours.

“The experience to help others in our community, I think, has truly impacted myself and the other fellow students who participated in this event,” Zoe Levy ‘17 said. “It was such an amazing feeling that all sorts of different organizations took part in this event. It was even more impressive to me that the mayor was able to join us. It really goes to show how great a community we live in.”

Following mandatory training at Earl Warren Showgrounds on Jan. 24, volunteers prepared for the upcoming event.

On Jan. 28 at 5:30 a.m., students and sponsors headed out in groups of four, with one experienced ‘team leader,’ to survey their “street friends.”

They used an application and each person took approximately 25 minutes to survey.

“The motivation I personally had with this was the chance to make an impact in someone’s life in our community, even if it was with a simple smile,” Levy said.