COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT
The Northern Illinois University Athletic Department takes great pride in giving back tolocal communities throughout the year. In the 2014-15 school year, NIU student-athletes completed over 4,800 hours of community service, averaging nearly 12 hours per student-athlete.
Each student-athlete is expected to participate in at least two (2) communityservice opportunities each semester (2 in the fall, 2 in the spring) that are organized by The Huskie Experience.
MONTHLY COMMUNITY SERVICE OPPORTUNITIES
At the beginning of each semester, The Huskie Experience will release a semestercalendar with all community service opportunities available to student-athletes. These events are tailored to monthly themes, such as "Huskie Generations" or "Huskies Against Hunger." The Huskie Experience team has worked on having 2-3 events available each month for student-athletes to choose from. These sign-up for these events are on a first come, first served basis.
ONGOING COMMUNITY SERVICE OPPORTUNITIES
In addition to monthly opportunities, The Huskie Experience will offer multiple ongoing opportunities for student-athletes to get involved in. Ongoing opportunities may include bingo at local nursing centers or community organizations, serving meals at Feed 'Em Soup, delivering meals for Meals on Wheels, or being a mentor for a middle school or elementary school student in the DeKalb School District.
HUSKIE HEROES MENTORING PROGRAM
Starting its sixth year in fall 2015, NIU Athletics has partnered with local schools todevelop a mentoring program between student-athletes and DeKalb students. The mentoring program began at Clinton-Rosette Middle School in 2010 and will now add Founders Elementary School to the program beginning in fall 2015.
Student-athletes involved in the mentoring program will meet with a middle school or elementary school student once a week for roughly 30 minutes at the school. Mentors and their students can play board games, crafts, sports, or just hang out together. After an informational meeting, background check, and initial meeting with the student, mentors can visit their student once a week at a time that fits their schedules. Mentors should prepare for a year-long commitment with their student, as semester-by-semester mentors can have a negative effect on the student.
HELPER HELPER
The Huskie Experience has partnered with Helper Helper, a community service app available on Android and Apple smartphones, to communicate community service opportunities to all NIU student-athletes. Through the free app, student-athletes can view and sign-up for available events. Some events may have a capped number of volunteers, so sign-up will be on a first come, first served basis through Helper Helper. Student-athletes are also able to see their completed community service hours, completed events, and team standings in overall community service.
Huskie Experience team reps will receive monthly community service updates from The Huskie Experience team via e-mail. These updates will include an attached report from Helper Helper listing each student-athlete, their total number of hours, the events they've completed, and the team's average hours per student-athlete. In addition to this document, the monthly updates will show you a list of student-athletes on the team that have yet to complete their two (2) events for that semester.
*Helper Helper will be the sole form of tracking community service hours for student-athletes. Please work with The Huskie Experience team if you have any questions about using the app.*
INDIVIDUAL OR TEAM COMMUNITY SERVICE
Teams and individual student-athletes are encouraged to complete community service outside of those organized by The Huskie Experience. Events must be voluntary and selfless in nature to be considered community service. No event which benefits NIU Athletics, or a specific team, will be counted as community service (e.g. NIU team camps/fundraisers).
Below is the process for completing individual or team community service:
- Speak to The Huskie Experience team about the event at least 2 weeks prior
- Have the organization fill out the Request for Student-Athlete Community Service Form at least 2 weeks before the event
- Once the event is approved by Compliance, The Huskie Experience team will contact the team Rep or individual student-athlete to let them know their event has been approved
- For team events, The Huskie Experience team will put the event on Helper Helper for student-athletes to sign-up for prior to the event
- For individual events, The Huskie Experience team will work with the student-athlete on the process of using "add Past Commitment" in Helper Helper
*Note: Any community service organized by an individual student-athlete or coach must have prior approval by Compliance and The Huskie Experience at least 2 weeks before the event. Any event submitted later risk not being credited for community service hours.
