9/11 How Will You Serve?

Eight years have passed since those four planes changed the lives of so many Americans on September 11, 2001. Survivors continue to cope, their children grow, rescuers struggle with the physical aftereffects of so many hours spent combing through the wreckage, and the new WTC is finally under construction. But for those not immediately effected by the attacks, enough time has passed that they becoming historical events, albeit mile markers in our lifetimes. So it is perhaps especially fitting that this year legislation has been enacted declaring September 11 A National Day of Service and Remembrance.

Service

The home page for 9/11 National Day of Service and Remembrance provides information about the purpose of the day, ways individuals can become involved, ways organizations or individuals can get service projects going or seek out additional volunteers, and links to other informational sites. Visitors are encouraged to post their own activities as a way to inspire others and stimulate others' thinking. If you are interested in volunteering, however, don't feel limited to the options offered by the 9/11 web site. VolunteerMatch offers additional opportunities to bring together volunteers and organizations online. Currently Danville's volunteer organizations are not well represented on the site, so if you are active in one you might want to suggest the site to the volunteer coordinator. Government volunteering opportunities have their own online site, Volunteer.gov, where users can identify possibilities by state. To locate opportunities locally, the United Way has assembled this list of Danville organizations and contact information, while Champaign-Urbana has cuvolunteer.org.

Want some ideas for simple acts of kindness and service? Check out HelpOthers.org, which offers lots of suggestions. The Random Acts of Kindness Foundation also offers ideas to promote kindness and service to others and even provides tools for teachers and individuals to use to get started in their own communities.

Remembrance

While the new designation for September 11 is intended to draw good from bad, it is also designed as an opportunity to remember and learn. To that end, the National September 11 Museum and Memorial at the World Trade Center is being planned. With the WTC complex still tangled in ongoing construction and funding issues, it remains in a virtual stage, but that leaves a lot available for exploration, including an extensive registry of artists and their works, oral histories recorded through the Library of Congress' StoryCorps project, and pictures and stories of the some of the artifacts that have been donated to the Museum. September 11 Bearing Witness to History, the Smithsonian's collection of artifacts related to the attacks, is an especially moving site, with an extensive set of artifacts and stories, while the September 11 Digital Archive offers one of the most comprehensive collections of information. And finally, the National Park Service is creating a memorial in Shanksville, PA where Flight 93 was brought down through the brave efforts of its passengers to defeat the hijackers. See the plans for the memorial here.