More than 500 volunteers give back at Mountain Day of Service 2026
With 49 sites, three counties, and more than five hundred volunteers giving back to the community, Mountain Day of Service 2026 was certainly one for the books. The annual Mountain Day tradition dates back to the early days of Lees-McRae, when founder Edgar Tufts gave students the day off to enjoy the natural environment with a hike and picnic on Beech Mountain.
Over the years, the tradition has evolved into a day of service, where Lees-McRae students, faculty, and staff leave the classroom and go out into the community for a day of volunteering.
Volunteers gathered in Williams Gymnasium to kick-off the day of service as a group.
This year’s volunteer sites reached further and wider than ever before and involved everything from food preparation at F.A.R.M. Café in Boone…
to cleaning facilities and socializing adoptable animals at Avery Humane Society in Newland…
to building a new trail through the woods right here on South Campus.
This year volunteers were also joined by some special guests. The film crew for “Jeff Corwin’s Southern Wild”—a new North Carolina nature-focused television program airing on ABC stations Saturday, Oct. 3 and featuring the college—joined a group of volunteers doing live staking work in the Elk Valley Preserve.
Live stakes are tree cuttings trimmed during the tree’s dormant winter months and kept alive for replanting. By keeping the stakes alive, the process allows the cuttings to root and sprout in their new location and is an excellent way to reforest treeless areas.
Live staking is especially important in the Elk Valley Preserve, as much of the plant and animal life within the 70-acre plot of environmentally protected land was decimated by Hurricane Helene two years ago. The area is still recovering, as downed trees cause habitat loss, disruption to plant and animal life, and warming in areas of the Elk River that are no longer shaded by tree cover. Planting live stakes in the area is a major step toward helping the environment continue to recover and thrive for years to come.
In addition to some sites who have long been part of the Mountain Day tradition, like Feeding Avery Families, Watauga County Public Library, and Helping Hands Wood Lot, volunteers also took on some new sites.
At Watauga County Project on Aging, an organization that works to provide independence to elderly residents of the county through programming and support services, volunteers provided garden clean-up. Casting Bread, a food pantry and soup kitchen based in Blowing Rock, kept volunteers busy with organizational tasks like cleaning and moving items.
Volunteers at Wine to Water, a Boone-based organization dedicated to securing clean water for all, helped assemble and build the organization’s portable water bottle-fitted Drop Filter.
Each year, Mountain Day of Service is an opportunity not only to get outside and enjoy our beautiful mountain home, but also to give back to the people, animals, and plants we share it with.
President Lee King joined a group of volunteers chopping and organizing wood at Helping Hands Wood Lot.
