This past weekend more than 180 Northeastern students, faculty, and staff set off to locations across the Americas for Alternative Spring Break, a weeklong immersive volunteer program.

Through this program, students use their spring break as an opportunity to provide direct services that address social issues such as affordable housing, disaster relief, and youth education.

This year’s service 17 programs include assisting with animal care at the Central Vermont Humane Society, installing solar panels for low-income families in Chico, California, and working on an organic farm in Belize. So of the programs are co-sponsored by Northeastern organizations such as the Center for Spirituality, Dialogue, and Service, and the Honors Program.

As the nation commemorates the 50th anniversary of the historic Selma to Montgomery voting rights march, a group of Northeastern students and faculty will travel to Alabama to learn about the history of Selma in the context of the Civil Rights Movement and take part in a variety of community service projects.

Here are some figures about this year’s volunteer troupe and the work being done throughout the week:

185 – The total number of volunteers participating in Alternative Spring Break 2015

8,000 – The number of service hours that Northeastern volunteers will complete

62,876 – The number of round-trip miles the volunteers will travel

9 – The number of U.S. states where teams are doing service projects

6 – The number of countries where teams are doing service projects

More than 1,400 – The number of volunteers who have participated in Northeastern’s Alternative Spring Break program since it launched in 2003