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Busy 2007 VIM/Visitors season winding down

Youngsters at the Fairfield Children’s Home playing with hand-made dolls
that were donated by congregations in the West Virginia Annual Conference
Two groups of visitors are due on campus in October/ November. The first is a 12-person VIM team, led by Tim Grace, that is expected to arrive in Zimbabwe on 28 October. The team will spend about a week on campus assisting with improvements to housing facilities for farm personnel and helping out at the Fairfield Children’s Home at the Old Mutare UMC Mission Centre. A 12-person mission interaction group, led by Rev. Lloyd Rollins, Director of Development in the AU Development Office in Nashville, will arrive in the country on 2 November. This group is comprised of United Methodists from Mississippi, Louisiana and northern Virginia and its members are looking forward to a first-hand experience of University’s ministry. These two groups round out a very busy Volunteers in Mission and visitors season for Africa University. The campus community has hosted ten VIM teams, with a combined total of more than a 100 persons, between May and August this year. The groups included youth, college students and adult professionals, all of whom have contributed their time, energy and skills to helping the University and the Zimbabwe Area UMC offer service to the wider community.

Members of the VIM team from UC-Berkeley’s Wesley Student Center helped to paint rooms in the student hostels during their one week stay at AU.

This year, VIM efforts focused on two critical areas improving water provision at the Old Mutare Mission Centre and the maintenance of physical facilities at Africa University and at the Mission Centre.