Building Pathways to Peace at Maryland Day 2023
Maryland Day always gets me excited. It’s a day filled with food and ice cream, fun music and dance, and of course, meeting many interesting people from all over campus and beyond. Last year's Maryland Day was a huge success and I was looking forward to seeing how people interacted with our activity and the type of conversations we were trying to create.
Maryland Day this year exceeded my expectations. Stella and I spent over a week preparing for this day. Cutting out 250 paper feet to add to our Pathway to Peace board and blowing up 100 balloons for the visiting children. Within an hour we had so many people engaging in our activity that we had to cut out 600 more feet and we went through 4 helium tanks of balloons!
Being a part of the Do Good Challenge with the university allowed us to meet so many people from all walks of life. We had small children who shared with us how important they believe recycling is. We met alumni of the University of Maryland that were amazed at the campus events we were holding. We engaged in conversations with students who had amazing insight into ways to achieve peace in the world.
Maryland Day gave me hope that there is a good future ahead of us. There were so many kids and young adults who shared so much passion and hope for the peaceful world they hoped to create. Parents and their children even shared their hopes and ideas with each other and collaborated on their answers for our prompt “ What can you do to be on the path to creating a more peaceful world?”
The positive and uplifting conversations I had with the hundreds of people that visited us really filled me with a feeling of pride and excitement. The balloons and stickers brought people to our table but I believe that they left with so much more.
About the Author:
Meredith is a senior at the University of Maryland majoring in Marketing and Management. After college, she hopes to travel the world and learn more about different countries and cultures. Meredith wants to combine her interest in business with her passion for helping others.