There is something about M-Fuge that has kept youth pastor Joe Monk coming back year after year since 1998.
Literacy program director Hillary Gardner hands out Leapfrog reading assessment games to students in the summer reading program to help determine their skill sets.“For youth, M-Fuge is a good introduction to missions and is very relational in its interaction with people,” said Monk, youth pastor at Fuquay Varina Baptist Church in Fuquay, N.C.
Approximately 4,000 youth from church groups around the nation will come and go on the Charleston Southern University campus this summer. These young people are part of M-Fuge, a ministry that offers mission projects to students and adults within a camp atmosphere.
Of the eight host sites, Charleston Southern hosts the largest group. CSU is unique as a host site as well, in that university students continue working with many of the community service projects during the fall that the youth?build relationships?with?during the summer.
Youth pastor Joe Monk reads with a student of the summer reading program at St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church in Charleston. The summer reading program, which takes place June 5-July 26, relies on M-Fuge for volunteer support.Once the youth arrive on campus, they are assigned to service projects throughout the Charleston area. One of the projects Monk worked with was the summer reading program at the community outreach center of St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church across from Marion Square in Charleston.
According to Literacy Program director Hillary Gardner, 25 inner-city children in kindergarten through seventh grade are participating in the program. The literacy outreach effort, named Connecting Hands, began in 2000 and encompasses programs focused on English as a second language, computer skills, arts and crafts, and reading assessment and instruction, throughout both a summer program and an after-school program.