The National Week of Service at The Art Institute of California — San Francisco

Students, Staff and Faculty from The Art Institute of California – San Francisco Lend a Helping Hand

[SAN FRANCISCO, APRIL, 2009] – Students, faculty and staff at The Art Institute of California —San Francisco will come together this week to volunteer their time and effort to the community for The Art Institute of California-San Francisco’s National Week of Service, scheduled for April 19-25, 2009. All Art Institutes schools across the country are planning community service projects, and The Art Institute of California — San Francisco will make St. Vincent de Paul Society of San Francisco the primary focus.

Volunteers from the school will help staff at the St. Vincent de Paul Society with various projects at San Francisco’s the Multi-Service Center, the largest homeless shelter in Northern California. Projects include assisting in the laundry, food services and facilities improvements.  Students and faculty in the Web Design & Interactive Media program will also begin working on a new Web site for The St. Vincent de Paul Society of San Francisco.

During The National Week of Service, Digital Filmmaking & Video Production students from The Art Institute of California – San Francisco will participate in a contest that will serve Bay area non-profits. Groups of students will each partner with a different non-profit agency in San Francisco and create a short promotional film. Students will have one week to work with the non-profit and create the video. The St. Vincent de Paul Society of San Francisco is just one of ten non-profit groups that will have a video created specifically for them.

The Art Institute of California — San Francisco will also host a blood drive with Blood Centers of the Pacific, a non-profit community blood bank, on Monday, April 20 from 11AM to 3PM, where staff, faculty and students can contribute to the blood supply for patients throughout the Bay Area.

“We have scheduled a variety of service projects for our National Week of Service, but all have one common thread: to lend a helping hand to those who need it most here in our community,” said Byron Chug, President of Art Institute of California — San Francisco.

For media inquiries, contact Jennifer Tomaro, Public Relations Director at The Art Institute of California — San Francisco, by phone at 415.276.1030 or by e-mail at jtomaro@aii.edu.

About The St. Vincent de Paul Society of San Francisco
The St. Vincent de Paul Society is one of San Francisco’s major human service organizations with various programs that help the most fragile people in our community - those suffering from homelessness, poverty, domestic violence and addiction.  The Society’s programs include the largest homeless shelter in Northern California, the largest continuum of battered women’s shelters and services in the city, and one of only two programs in San Francisco that distributes free clothing.  Every day the St. Vincent de Paul Society feeds, clothes, shelters and helps over 1,000 men, women and children, serving more than 75,000 individuals a year.  For more information, please visit www.svdp-sf.org.

About The Art Institute of California — San Francisco
The Art Institute of California — San Francisco is one of The Art Institutes (www.artinstitutes.edu), a system of over 40 education institutions located throughout North America, providing an important source of design, media arts, fashion and culinary arts professionals.

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