Ministries

Volunteers form groups of two or more that meet once a week from 3:25 until around 4 p.m. to smile and hand out cookies to students crossing the Spellman Overpass into Old Greenbelt.

Started eight years  ago when a church member heard that students were being harassed on the Greenbelt side of the Spellman overpass, the church decided to become a visible presence.   An initial group of three people began handing out cookies one day a week. Occasionally one of the members would bring his chess set and challenge the youth to a game. As the youth got to know us they began to talk to us about their day, about their plans, even about their schoolwork.

The program grew to five days a week with volunteers from civic organizations, churches and city council participating.  Today, except on extremely cold or rainy days, there are people signed up to hand out cookies to the youth from 3:10 to 4 p.m.

 The group hands out about 60 cookies a day. Some of the kids don’t take a cookie, they just share a word or two.  For the students who cross the bridge, our presence there says they are not alone. A lot of the kids ask why we’re there. We just tell them that we care.