Spring In Full Swing

I always notice that January feels like the longest month, but then February flies by! Compared to January, February was a fairly calm month for FOCUS since we are in between big events. We have some exciting things planned at UTD, such as our Student Outreach Week and Resurrection Fair this spring! And our campus-wide Pizza Theology lecture will be on April 2nd!

One of my favorite memories from February is attending a Black History Month showcase put on by BLISS (Black Lives in Soulful Solidarity), a student group started by our UTD FOCUS pastor Lailah Duke. The showcase was called RELEASE and it featured so. much. Black. talent! We watched dance performances, listened to music and singing, heard some spoken word, and even became the second line of a first line brass band! All the performers and Lailah did an amazing job, and I hope Release becomes an annual event!

Some of the performers, an African drum and dance ensemble called Bandan Koro, invited members of the audience to dance with them onstage!

Before we know it, this school year will be over! May is a big month for FOCUS. Every year, we send students from our campuses up to Bellingham, Washington for the Student Institute of Campus Ministry, known as SICM. Most of our student leaders attend SICM, where they grow in their faith and learn leadership skills. Plus, it’s a great time for sightseeing and building relationships with other students!

Here I am with some of the other UTD girls I went to SICM with in 2019!

This year, travel costs have driven the price of SICM up to around $1000 per student, and some students need extra help fundraising to pay for the trip. If you’d like to make a general donation towards training these future student leaders, you can do so at https://anyfocus.churchcenter.com/giving/to/sicm-donations.

If you’d like to support a SPECIFIC student’s trip, you can do so at https://anyfocus.org/pay4sicm/.

I have one more important announcement to share with you! You may have heard that the U.S. Department of Education intends to remove regulations that explicitly protect religious student organizations like FOCUS.

These regulations say that public universities and colleges cannot deny us the rights and privileges afforded to other student groups because of our beliefs, practices, policies, speech, membership standards, or leadership standards. The new proposal is to remove these regulations. This not only affects Christian groups, but other religious student groups as well.

The public has until March 24th to comment on the proposal, and we are asking everyone in our network to do so -- staff, students, ministry partners, and partner churches.

We have set up a webpage to explain the situation further and make it as easy as possible to leave a comment. Follow the link for more info! https://anyfocus.org/campusaccess/

Last but not least, I want to share the FOCUS student testimony for the month of March!