Big Days & Focus Weeks

Join the PSU community as we dig in to specific issues through educational events, teach-ins, and service projects on a single day or during a single week!

What are Big Days & Focus Weeks?

Along with universities and organizations across the nation, we organize large-scale days or weeks of engagement to bring our campus community together to put a spotlight on certain social issues and cultivate a spirit of engagement through service, learning, connection, and reflection. Each of our Big Days and Focus Weeks provide a great opportunity to get out into the community and form connections with other engaged students as you learn, discuss, listen, and engage together to build awareness and work towards positive change around a common cause.

We engage students in three Big Days / Focus Weeks throughout the year:

Fall Term: Hunger & Homelessness Awareness Week (third week of November)
Winter Term: Annual Racial Justice Teach-In presented by the MLK Racial Justice Campus Collaborative (typically the Saturday after MLK Day)
Spring Term: Focus on Environmental Justice in April (often the third week in April)

A brief description of each of these events is below. If registration is open for an upcoming Focus Week or Big Day, you'll see a link to learn more and sign up. Join us in these community education and action events, as we serve, learn, and lead together!

Five students smile for the camera while standing around a table holding bags of rice they are filling from a central bag.

Hunger & Homelessness Awareness Week

Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week is an annual program where people come together across the country to draw attention to the issues of hunger and homelessness. Typically the third week of November, we help organize educational and service opportunities featuring community partners on and off campus.

A paper sun reads "Our Beloved Community" and includes message from students written on each ray of the sun about what "Our Beloved Community" means to them

Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Engagement

In observation of the legacy of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., we join with other local area colleges and universities for a day of workshops, discussion, and engagement with Black-led nonprofits and community interest groups dedicated to community building and racial justice in the Portland Metro area.

This Year: Defining Abolition

Kneeling student bends over plants while working in the garden

Focus on Environmental Justice: Earth Week

During the week of Earth Day (April 22nd), we collaborate with the Student Sustainability Center to explore topics related to food, environmental justice, social sustainability, and more. Stay tuned for this year's events!

For a day full of learning about civil rights and the legacy of Dr. King, I was empowered through the different presentations that were given, the communicative discussion between students and community activists as well as the evening service project at the women’s shelter. It was a great day in itself but the impact it had on me was bigger than I hoped it would be. I learned a lot and shared my ideas and my questions about civil rights, and that allowed me to better understand what it means to find one’s purpose in life.