{ACROSS THE STREET AND AROUND THE GLOBE}
Kate Rust
Sara Del Castillo
From poverty, a wealth of understanding Two Millsaps College students spent the summer of 2013 working for nonprofits in Florida and Massachusetts that provide educational programs for youngsters. Sara Del Castillo, a senior, and Kate Rust, a junior, are the first two Millsaps students to complete internships as part of the Shepherd Higher Education Consortium on Poverty. The consortium, which Millsaps joined in the fall of 2012, involves multiple academic disciplines and 19 institutions in educating graduate and undergraduate students on poverty, both in the classroom and during internships. Millsaps alumnus Howard Pickett, B.A. 1998, directs the Shepherd Program for the Interdisciplinary Study of Poverty and Human Capability at Washington and Lee University, which is the home of the program. The
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Shepherd Program began in 1997 and integrates academic study and learning through service and reflection. Del Castillo, who is involved on campus with Amnesty International, the College Democrats, and the Mississippi Young Women’s Summit, worked as a mentor and tutor to pre-school, elementary, and middle school students enrolled in the Migrant Education Program of the Hillsborough County Public Schools System in Tampa, Fla. “These children often experience difficulty in school because they must frequently travel from one city or state to another in search of work on farms for economic survival,” said Del Castillo, who is from Ocean Springs. “On the elementary and pre-school levels, I worked on reading, math, and English skills with the children. I also worked on issues of body image, self esteem, social integration, confidence building, and leadership development with the middle school girls.” Rust worked as a reading coordinator for Tenacity, a nonprofit organization in Boston that provides after-school, in-school,