Service Projects Return in Force for 2025 Reunions

The 2025 Yale College reunions convened more than 4,900 alumni from the classes of 1960 through 2020 on campus over two bustling weekends. Alumni and their families visited Dwight Hall for an ongoing Service Project and gathered in the Dwight Hall Library for an Open House.

The Open House fostered discussion and reflection on community engagement during and after college. Alumni dropped handwritten notes into the Dwight Hall Time Capsule, which holds the stories and memories of Dwight Hall alumni. Many alumni who graduated before 2018 experienced a new-and-improved, post-renovation Dwight Hall for the first time, with updated accessibility features to make it a more inclusive space for students.

Upstairs in the Samuel Priest Rose ’77 Social Justice Network Room, Maddalena Ledezma ’26 managed personal care kit assembly for distribution to members of the New Haven community experiencing homelessness and housing insecurity. In the first weekend alone, volunteers created 291 kits, a new record for the reunions service project.

Thanks to the leadership of Ernest Morris ’00, the 25th reunion co-chair, the service projects saw a strong turnout.

“It was very important to the Class of 2000 to engage in a community service project in New Haven while back at Yale for our 25th reunion. Partnering with Dwight Hall gave us an opportunity to participate in an important project with immediate impact in a location convenient for all reunion attendees to participate. The project helped us to put our reunion theme, ‘Y2K: Still Bridging the Gap,’ into practice by helping to bridge the gap between the university and some of its less fortunate neighbors. Hopefully other classes will be inspired to organize service projects during every Yale reunion.”

– Ernest Morris ’00

The personal care kits contain 19 different travel-sized items carefully selected to meet the needs of people living without reliable housing, including band-aids, bathing wipes, and Bombas socks. Volunteers wrote encouraging notes to include in the packages, which are distributed to local community partner organizations in the Greater New Haven community. Johnny Scafidi ’01, Dwight Hall’s Director of Community Outreach and Engagement, developed the personal care kit project through a collaborative, responsive process with community members and local advocates. “Dwight Hall works closely with community partners to ensure that the contents balance utility and portability,” says Johnny. This year, care kits were donated to Liberty Community Services and Midnight Run Collective.

Diamond Tree (left) and Fran Jaworowicz (right) pose with care kits at the IRIS/CSK Warehouse, which they will distribute along with clothing donations from the Dwight Hall clothing bin.

Dwight Hall thanks every volunteer who took a moment out of their busy weekend to create a care package. If you are interested in hosting a personal care kit drive and packing activity in your own community, check out the list of recommended items and reflections here.