The Jesuit Volunteer Corps announce recently that five graduates from Xavier University have committed to serve as Jesuit Volunteers. They have dedicated themselves to a year or more of simple living and working for social justice in a spiritually supportive community as they walk with people living in poverty or on the margins of society.

Sarah McGill, a 2006 theology major from Omaha, Neb., is living in New Orleans, and working at Crescent House.

Shannon Hughes, a 2007 English major from Cincinnati, is living in Majuro, Marshall Islands and working at Assumption Secondary School.

Jessica Fullenkamp, a 2007 social work graduate from Troy, Ohio, is living in Chuuk, Micronesia and working at Saramen Chuuk Academy.

Amanda Lattanzio, a 2007 psychology graduate from Canfield, Ohio, is living in Raleigh, N.C. and working at People of Faith Against the Death Penalty.

Kimberly Herrmann, a 2007 psychology graduate from Waterville, Ohio, is living and working in San Diego, Calif.

In the United States this year, 207 Jesuit Volunteers will minister by teaching students of all ages, providing legal services, working with refugees and immigrants, serving with social services and at community centers, organizing in low-income communities and caring for people with HIV/AIDS. Jesuit Volunteer communities live in large the urban settings of Detroit, Chicago, Boston, New York, Houston, San Francisco and Los Angeles and in smaller cities such as El Paso, Texas; Portland, Maine and Raleigh, North Carolina. The East region of the Jesuit Volunteer Corps is the largest this year, commissioning 79 volunteers. 70 volunteers were missioned by the Southwest, 34 by the South and 22 by the Midwest.

Internationally, 53 Jesuit Volunteers are fulfilling a two-year commitment to Jesuit Volunteers International in Belize, Nicaragua, Peru, Nepal, Micronesia, the Marshall Islands and Tanzania. The volunteers accompany the poor in these developing countries while they work in schools, with youth and in parishes.

To date, there are more than 12,000 former Jesuit Volunteers. More information isavailable at www.jesuitvolunteers.org.