On Saturday, September 12, 2020, students at the Angers campus carried out solidarity actions, ensuring that protective measures were observed.
Every year,the school's solidarity association (GaSole) organizes a unifying project carried out by 150 first-year students. Normally, students gather at a single site to carry out volunteer work for the community. This year, the organizing team, made up of second-year students, adapted the format and organization of the project due to the health situation by dividing the students into groups of 20 to 30 people.
A commitment to local partners
For this solidarity day, students carried out activities for various partners: national organizations such asEmmaüs and L’Outil en Main; and more local associations such as Philodome, an Angers-based resource center that promotes environmental protection by giving bulky waste a second life. Alongside these partnerships, students also organized their own initiatives, including cleaning the streets of Angers in partnership with the city, and making cloth masks for charity.
The volunteers moved 70m3 of clothing from an Emmaus warehouse to be recycled, and helped to receive and sort donations. They also cleared, weeded, and cleaned the new premises of L'Outil en Main, where some even learned masonry or how to build a fence. At another site run by the same association, students moved and used 4.5 tons of sand, 500 kg of cement, and 1.5 tons of stones to level an area and install cisterns. At Philodome, they sorted, folded, and moved around 80 boxes of clothing from various donations. Finally, the first-year students filled around 40 bags with urban waste and made around 30 fabric masks.
Solidarity: a core value for Arts et Métiers students
This unifying project is part of the school's orientation period. It is an opportunity for second-year students to pass on to first-year students the values of solidarity and mutual aid that are dear to them. Volunteers get to know each other and develop their team spirit, while demonstrating the commitment of Arts et Métiers students Arts et Métiers the community and the environment.
