Each year Good Shepherd sends a team of young adults and leaders to Appalachia to work with ASP.
Appalachia Service Project (ASP) provides one of the most rewarding structured service opportunities in the nation — bringing thousands of volunteers from around the country to rural Central Appalachia to repair homes for low-income families. But ASP is more than just a home repair program. Yes, Appalachia’s poorest families urgently need your help, but they can help change your life, too. Because when you change the lives of others, they have a way of changing you.
After a few days of hard work repairing homes with ASP, your hands will grow a little tougher, your arms a little stronger, and your relationship with God a whole lot deeper. You’ll return home to your community with a passion for service, a renewed compassion for other people, and a fresh appreciation for your place and purpose in this world. Best of all, you’ll discover first-hand that regardless of geography, education, or economic class, we are all equal members of the family of God.
We like to say that our goal is to make homes “warmer, safer and drier” for needy families. And for more than 40 years, we’ve done exactly that for thousands of families. Yet for all that, we are only able to serve one in five families who apply to us for help. We need many, many more volunteers to make a lasting dent in Appalachian poverty.