Junior Student Congress (StuCo) community service committee officer Austin Bareis started the Hospital Drive for Busy Books on Feb. 3 and plans on delivering them to Children’s Medical Center on Feb. 28.

In order to make the Busy Books, the students in Bareis’ committee take six pages from either coloring books or online coloring pages and staple pages together. They then take three crayons and put them on the front of the packet. Bareis’ goal was to make 100 busy books, and his committee of about 20 people have managed to make 100 in two StuCo meetings.

Since StuCo is divided into eight committees, in order for Bareis to be able to go through with his Busy Books drive, he had to talk to his senior chairman Ankita Nayak.

“I said to go ahead and implement it,” Nayak said. “The idea is that 2nd semester, the seniors sit back and juniors take over, to prepare for next year. This coming semester, I’m kind of just giving the reins to Austin so he can handle things himself. I’m just on the side to help him.”

Bareis discovered the idea by searching the Children’s Medical Center website after previous visits to the hospital for triathlon injuries. While looking at what he was able to volunteer for, he discovered Busy Books.

“I do triathlons and stuff and that can be a pretty dangerous sport, so I’ve been in and out of the hospital,” Bareis said. “I thought it would be just something cool to do – to give back to some kids that were in there, whether they were injured or sick.”