Tiger Serve Day points students to lives of service
October 04, 2026
- Mary Beth SorgEach semester, the students at Ouachita Baptist University gather to serve the community of Arkadelphia through Tiger Serve Day. Saturday, Sept. 26, marked the 59th service day, bringing together 723 students, faculty and staff across 90 teams.
The day is coordinated by Ouachita's Elrod Center for Family & Community, as staff and student leadership teams organize projects, recruit volunteers and provide supplies and tools for the work.
“I love that Tiger Serve Day gave me an opportunity to get plugged into this school and to the community around me,” said Riley Smith, a junior communication sciences & disorders major from Little Rock, Arkansas. “It was such a perfect way to serve and have fellowship with one another just as Christ tells us to. Tiger Serve Day has taught me how big of an impact we can make just by taking a few hours out of our day!”
Smith was on a team that served Diane Runyan and her husband. Runyan had previously worked at the Elrod Center for 20 years and had been part of 40 Tiger Serve Days.
Diane Runyan, center left, with the TSD team that visited her.
“My favorite thing about working at the Elrod Center was talking to the people who called and hearing about their lives,” said Runyan. “I loved getting to know the students and spending time with the Tiger Serve Day leadership team.”
This year, TSD embraced the theme “Good Stewards,” taken from 1 Peter 4:10-11, “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God’s varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies — in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.”
The theme was especially reflected in the team that visited Runyan. Although the students came to serve, Runyan herself invested two decades at the Elrod Center helping connect Arkadelphia residents with Ouachita volunteers.
Participating volunteers completed projects that included yard work, home cleaning and car washing. In addition to their work, volunteers had the opportunity to connect with community members, build relationships and pray with those they served.
TSD takes place each semester to support the community and show students what it means to steward their God-given gifts to serve others. For more information about Tiger Serve Day and the Elrod Center, please visit obu.edu/elrod or contact Leigh Anne McKinney at [email protected] or 870-245-5323.
Lead photo by Evie Stake
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