Warren Wilson Students Hop Into Action for 2025 Work Day
The Echo Staff | April 10, 2025
This Thursday, students at Warren Wilson College (WWC) joined together for a historic tradition, jumping into projects across campus for Work Day. From construction projects to thank-a-thons, the community showed out to do what we do best: gettin’ it done!
Work Day leans into the unique culture of the work college, giving everyone a chance to pitch in on projects that pull the school together.
Photo by Cal Dooley
Ben Blackmar, a fine woodworking professor, led students in fabricating 10 new fence gates to replace those destroyed in Hurricane Helene. The students had split up into teams – processing lumber and, through some trial and error, assembling them.
“I help college students discover how weird they are and show them how awesome it is,” Blackmar said.
This was the first work day for Alisha Conde, the supervisor for the Ecological Landscaping Crew. Conde proposed landscaping projects for Work Day, along with spending several days preparing peer leaders to oversee volunteers.
“I feel like the majority of the student body are dirt-worshiping hippies like myself…not just the students, but the admin, the faculty, staff,” Conde said. “It is a replenishing-the-soul sort of moment where you can get away from the emails, you can get away from homework or classes and just ground yourself in tasks that bring the college up together.”
Photo by Ryleigh Johnson
Madelyn Ford, a sophomore transfer student who works on the Ecological Landscaping Crew, was one of the peer leaders whom Conde trained.
“I think it's so cool that everybody's willing to get out here and get their hands dirty,” Ford said. “I came from this really crazy city school that was super law, business, uptight, and I could never imagine that student body getting down on their hands and knees and weeding. It's nice to be around a community that is so up for anything…It reminds me of how unique Warren Wilson is.”
Beyond working on projects or serving as peer leads, some students chose to take a more assisting role in the Work Day. Piper Gross, sporting a neon yellow vest, served as a Wilderness First Responder (WFR), ready to provide first aid if needed.
“I am providing a supportive role,” Gross said. “I am stepping in when people need assistance; it's a very behind-the-scenes kind of role…I'm excited to just be a moment of support for people or a step back if they need to take a moment from their project.”
Students, faculty, and administrators reflected on the power of Work Day to foster connection within the WWC community, along with putting responsibility in the hands of community members.
“I think it's really cool to see the campus come together and truly go in on projects,” Kaleb Bucht said. “Seeing how much we can get done in such a short amount of time when we all work together is really cool…they [projects] would have taken forever before, but now in three or four hours we got it.”
“I’ve met so many people doing Work Day that I didn’t even know existed at the school,” Zoie Green, a sophomore, said.
“I think it’s just a really great way to reconnect as a community with students and faculty and staff all working together on these projects, and almost like a day of celebration, like recognizing what we’re trying to do here at Warren Wilson,” Pat Ciccotto, assistant professor of biology and chair of the conservation biology program, said. “It’s actually one of my favorite days of the academic year, just being able to participate in this kind of work with everyone.”
Photo by Kai Goldstein
This is Sam Kobylarz’s, a senior on the Herbarium Crew, third work day. Kobylarz worked to clean out a neglected pole barn used to store construction materials for multiple crews, hauling out rotten wood and organizing materials
“[Work day] brings everyone together and helps get bigger projects done that smaller crews may not be able to get done,” Kobylarz said.
Photo by Vivian Bryan
Community is something that WWC holds dear; as such, it was only fair that a Work Day project was done to benefit the recovering Western North Carolina (WNC) area.
Maeve Williams, leader of the Construction Crew, helped direct a project focused on building a tiny house for a local family in need.
“We’ve got a few different things going on with people in the back, building a shed for all of our solar panel equipment that's going to be running through the top down,” Williams said. “Then there are people on the inside building the second-floor loft, and then we have, on the outside, people just finishing up the trim on the edges of the roof. We're doing this to give back to our community.”
Maintenance Crew member Molly Ryan-O’Flaherty experienced their first Work Day, helping construct the fence along Warren Wilson Road. Ryan-O’Flahery was working on the table saw, cutting pieces of wood as measurements came in. They did not sign up for a project, but decided to come anyways.
“I've been strung out and scattered the past few weeks,” Ryan-O’Flaherty said. “ I think that's sort of how everybody's feeling. So I just followed my friend here, and I'm so glad I did.”
Many students shared the desire for Work Day to be a full-day occasion. Students such as Ryan O-Flaherty and Kobylarz believe that expanding the working hours would allow for more in-depth projects to be completed, as well as making up for the fact that Work Day is only once a year.
Despite these frustrations, Ryan-O'Flaherty maintained that Work Day was a positive example of the potential of the work program.
“I think [Work Day] represents what I want the work program to feel like and look like and the way I wish it would operate,” Ryan-O’Flaherty said. “I think it's a reminder that we can return to that and it'll look different and maybe even be better.”
With stomachs full of fresh pork BBQ roasted overnight by Farm Crew members, students settled in circles on the lawn surrounding the Morris Pavilion, taking time to decompress and reflect with friends and staff alike. Only a few stragglers were left kicking a hacky-sack as the early spring rain trickled down and students filtered away, marking the end of yet another WWC Work Day.
