Lilly Global Day of Service and FHC: Year 14

FHC is prepped and ready thanks to
Lilly Global Day of Service!

Since 2008, Lilly employees have volunteered in local communities for their annual “Lilly Global Day of Service.” Here at the Felege Hiywot Center, we have been one of those lucky recipients of their generosity of time and resources since the inception of the Lilly program. Some of the volunteers here last week have been coming to the farm since that first year!

According to Lilly’s website, over 1.2 million hours have been donated by Lilly employees to their local communities in 65 countries! WOW! How lucky are we to be a small part of that?

This year, we had over 30 Lilly employees arrive at the farm on September 23rd. Not one of those volunteers was ever looking for work to do– we had plenty of tasks to go around after a summer program’s worth of planting and crops.

They beautified the front of the Center (see all of these photos below!) and really upped our curbside appeal. They assisted with weeding, ground covering, and mulch across all of the gardens. Additionally, an inside crew did a deep clean and refresh of the kitchen inside the Center.

The timing of this couldn’t be better for us. Our much-anticipated Rise Initiative, able to happen in very large part thanks to a Lilly Endowment grant, will begin the week of October 11.

We are anticipating between 14-18 of our summer youth participants returning to this year-long program. What a lovely way to welcome new and returning students– a clean center and gardens, ready for their hard work!

Thank you, Lilly employees, for your dedication to FHC and your heart for volunteering and service to your community.

“Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.” – Helen Keller