42 | FEBRUARY 15 • 2024 J
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here are many reasons to volunteer 
your time in February. To start, 
volunteering strengthens your 
community. As a volunteer, you can help 
improve schools, support youth through 
mentoring and after-school programs, and 
beautify the community. 
You may even discover 
hidden talents you didn’t 
know were inside. Read 
on to learn about many 
ways you can help our 
community.
Lighthouse was 
established in 2019 when 
Lighthouse of Oakland 
County and South Oakland Shelter 
combined forces and merged agencies. 
Lighthouse endeavors to build equitable 
communities that alleviate poverty 
in partnership with and in service to 
individuals, families and organizations. 
The organization is always in need of 
volunteers at their Pontiac Food Pantry, 
Pontiac Warehouse/Distribution Center 
and at the Emergency Food Distribution 
at Lakeland Senior Apartments. 
Volunteers can sign up to help at any 
of the locations by visiting https://
lighthousemi.org.
Class Act Detroit provides free youth 
programming based on the elements 

of hip hop. It serves youth of all ages 
by creating community and nurturing 
leadership through arts education. Class 
Act is housed in a 13,000-square-foot 
building, previously a house of worship, 
and is in the process of renovating. As 
the renovations are 70% complete, the 
organization is looking for volunteers 
to help finish the space. To learn more, 
visit www.classactdetroit.org.
Rescue MI Nature Now Inc. is 
dedicated to developing green spaces 
within the community and providing 
nature-based educational programs. 
It does this by purchasing unused 
or underused parcels of land and 
transforming them into community green 
space by planting trees, flowers and other 
native plants. Along with transforming 
unused land, Rescue MI Nature Now 
places insect hotels on the improved 
parcels and educates the community on 
the important role honeybees play in 
pollination. They are actively seeking 
corporate groups or community groups 
to help plant trees, seed the ground and 
do light cleanup. Email Zenaida Flores 
at ZFlores@rescuenaturenow.org to get 
involved.
The mission of Serenity Oaks Equine 
Sanctuary is to provide a haven for 
off-the-track thoroughbreds, offering 

a soft landing for decompression and 
retirement from racing. Their goal is 
to implement therapy programs for the 
horses and people who are survivors 
of PTSD, domestic violence, learning 
challenges, economic hardships, etc. 
Serenity Oaks is looking for help from 
experienced horse people. This is also 
a wonderful opportunity for teens to 
do a mitzvah project. To volunteer, 
email Serenityoakses@gmail.com.
For Goodness Cakes matches 
volunteers to make and hand-deliver 
birthday and graduation cakes to children 
in foster care and youth overcoming 
adversity on their special day. It doesn’t 
matter if you’re a beginner or a baker 
pro, these children and young adults are 
excited for anything you make them! To 
become a volunteer, you must take the 
online orientation. The orientation has 
two parts: How We Work and Food Safety. 
Once complete, volunteers visit the Task 
Calendar, which has all the cake requests 
and details (date, type, age, theme/
colors, delivery address, timing window). 
All baking is done in the volunteer’s 
own kitchen. To get started, visit www.
forgoodnesscakes.org/detroit-mi. 

If your organization is looking for volunteers, email 

Samantha Foon at samanthafoon14@gmail.com for 

possible inclusion in an upcoming column.

Several organizations could use your help this month.
Volunteers Wanted

Samantha 
Foon
Contributing 
Writer

OUR COMMUNITY

For Goodness 
Cakes is looking for 
volunteer bakers.

