Alternative Breaks
If you're looking to get involved and make a difference through community service, then Alternative Breaks is for you.
Alternative Breaks, a student organization supported by the Center for Civic Engagement provides students of Illinois State with opportunities to enact social change. Alternative Breaks hosts local, national, and global service trips to help meet needs of communities. Students can volunteer to help build homes to address affordable housing, feed those facing food insecurity, tutor young children, and much more.
To learn more about Alternative Breaks trips, read this Redbird Impact article about a Spring 2018 trip. You can also browse a variety of news articles about Alternative Breaks over the years.
Choose Your Experience
We offer several options to get involved with Illinois State's Alternative Breaks:
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Alternative Spring Break (ASB)
Alternative Spring Break (ASB) is a weeklong service opportunity during the University's Spring Break in which participants travel to help meet a need in a community.
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Alternative Winter Break (AWB)
Alternative Winter Break (AWB) offers one international trip and one domestic trip where participants strengthen communities.
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Alternative Summer Break (ASuB)
Alternative Summer Break (ASuB) is a 2.5-week service trip in which participants travel to Kenya to support Living Positive Kenya, a local organization in Ngong Hills.
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Alternative Weekends
Alternative Weekends allows those familiar with Alternative Breaks and those new to the program to explore active citizenship—people who value the community as a priority when making decisions in their daily lives.
What to Expect On Your Trip
Service and reflection. We believe in strong direct service that will have a lasting impact on a community. We work with our community partners at all of our service sites to make sure that our students will be participate in meaningful service work. You can expect 6-8 hours of daily service.
Nightly reflection is a core to the Alternative Breaks program. Students engage in conversations and activities to make meaning out of their service and the affect they are having both on their community and on themselves. Reflection is what makes our program unique from others on campus.
After the trips are completed, students share with us how reflection helped them to understand how they can make a difference in their communities.
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Our Vision:
An inspired campus which enacts social change locally, nationally, and globally.
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Our Mission:
To challenge Illinois State to become involved leaders in cultural and social awareness through education, strong direct service, and reflection.