Shock amid the service
Grants, N.M., is a small city just east of the Continental Divide. Its population is roughly equal to that of Harvard College and its per capita income — about $14,000 — would buy two semesters of room and board. Last month, Grants was home base for 10 undergraduates on a service trip sponsored by the Phillips Brooks House Association. The students, working with two Ohio medical volunteers, did child health surveys at Head Start Program operations in one corner of the vast Navajo Nation tribal area. Taking yearly measures of vision, hearing, blood pressure, height, weight, and other factors is required to maintain federal funding. During the 10-day trip, students also delivered firewood and food to elderly Navajo in remote parts of the reservation. (One of them was Joe Vandever, one of the last surviving Navajo Code Talkers from World War II.) The deliveries, guided by employees of the St. Bonaventure Indian Mission...