When Matt Kleiman '10 visited Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve in New Orleans on the National College Volunteers trip in March, he was struck by the importance of preserving the city's natural beauty in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. "New Orleans is really a beautiful city, and it's just a shame to let it be in shambles," Kleiman said.

Kleiman was one of 18 students who participated in the second NCV trip to New Orleans from March 19 to 24. Of the 18 students, eight of them were Brandeis students: Noah Kaplan '08, co-founder of the national organization and Brandeis NCV president, Gaurav Gharti-Chhetri '10, Adam Greenblatt '10, Jaehwan Oh '10, Kleiman, Tia Oliver '10, Maiya Marshall '08 and Nicole Rosenberg '10 represented Brandeis volunteering, along with 10 Tufts University students

Inspired by a volunteer trip to New Orleans with the Brandeis and Tufts Hillels last spring, Kaplan and Tufts senior Jonah Peppiatt, decided last summer to create NCV. The group received non-profit status last spring break.

Last August, Kaplan, Vareschi, Gharti-Chhetri and six Tufts students went on the first NCV trip.

"Brandeis has only a couple of organizations . that do community service on a national level," said Kaplan.

Kaplan said students were able to go on the August trip for free because of donations from the Society for the Advancement of Judaism, the synagogue Kaplan and Peppiatt attend. Several Tufts organizations, including Tisch College, Hillel and the Institute for Global leadership, also contributed donations.

Before the students participated on their second trip in March, the Student Union allotted the organization funds to cover the Brandeis students' flights and other expenses in New Orleans.

NCV members stayed at the Wesley Foundation, a Christian organization at Tulane University, and worked with two relief organizations, Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now and Common Ground. Volunteers cleaned up an arson site and walked dogs at an animal shelter.

Kaplan hoped trip participants would gain a full experience of New Orleans, including visiting New Orleans' wetlands and participating in community service activity.

"We wanted NCV to learn from going down to New Orleans ... do more than community service," Kaplan said.

It was important for volunteers to survey the devastation and "learn as much about the crisis post-Katrina as possible," Kaplan said.

The group met with important individuals in political, academic and disaster-linked areas, he added in a phone interview.

Volunteers also visited Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve, which protects the wetlands and other natural resources of the Mississippi River Delta.

"The whole group was just basically enchanted by Jean Lafitte National Park," Kaplan said. It's widely acknowledged that the wetlands lessen the force of hurricanes as they hit the New Orleans coast, he added in a phone interview.

Kaplan said the visit to the wetlands was a chance for the group to put in perspective how special the wetlands are to New Orleans. "We realized that the effort to protect the wetlands is very important," he explained.

Health care in New Orleans was one of the most significant issues trip members discussed.

Kaplan said students realized after the trip that the issue of health care remained problematic in New Orleans. NCV members spoke with Professor T.J. Sturnova at Tulane University about the health care crisis in the city. Sturnova recommended that NCV partner with the New Orleans Faith Health Alliance, a health clinic.

Another component of the trip was hearing speakers who offered different perspectives about the situation in New Orleans. Many focused on the problems that contributed to the devestating aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Sandy Rosenthal, one speaker, founded levees.org, an organization that raises awareness about flood protection and about the role that levees constructed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers played in Katrina's devastation of New Orleans.

"[Rosenthal] basically gave us the idea that . New Orleans was . a catastrophe that didn't have to happen," Kaplan said. "She basically blames it all on the failure of the levees and because the corps of engineers did not construct the levees to the highest standards. There was a lack of responsibility to make sure certain areas were protected as much as other areas."

Other speakers included Police Captain Brian Weiss, Wes Kungel, regional representative to Senator Mary Landrieu's office, and staff at Tulane.

Weiss specifically discussed the role the police force played during Katrina's aftermath. "[Weiss] showed us a lot of bias and viewpoints" in the media and clarified that only six officers did not report for duty after Katrina, a number much smaller than that the media portrayed, Kleiman said.

Tulane staff described the delay in response to Hurricane Katrina. Kaplan recalled that the speakers said, "they just weren't ready for this kind of catastrophe, but after the hurricane happened and swept through the city, it took a while for organizations to respond."

The group's volunteerism did not end with their return to Brandeis.

"We were not only going to go down and do community service . but also bring our experience back here and do something positive," Kaplan said. The group has been working from Waltham as a consulting agency for health clinics in New Orleans, such as the New Orleans Faith Health Alliance, Kaplan added in a phone interview.

"In Waltham ... we could use our resources . and get things done in a health clinic in New Orleans from Brandeis," he added. After meeting with Janet Dileo, one of NOFHA's representatives, NCV decided to publicize the organization by creating Web sites and Facebook groups.

Kaplan hopes to broaden NCV to other colleges throughout the country.

"National Collegiate Volunteers should be an organization that starts from Brandeis and Tufts going on trips together," Kaplan said. Kaplan added in a phone interview that Brandeis and Tufts students co-founded NCV because of their similar roots in active citizenship and the pursuit of social justice.

"Eventually we want to expand it to other schools," Kaplan said.

Over the summer, Kaplan created the National Collegiate Volunteers Web site, www.nationalcollegiatevolunteers.org.

NCV plans to go on another volunteer trip to New Orleans, tentatively between August 18 and 24, and is currently seeking applicants for the trip.

The organization is dedicated to providing students with free community service trips and is looking for sources of funding for the next trip.

"We believe that students should be able to go on these trips for free," Kaplan said. "We feel that we should alleviate these . financial barriers to community service trips.