A fall break trip with the theme "Geaux to the Gulf — Let the Good Times Roll" sounds like just that, a good time.

This trip, however, was coordinated to help bring the good times back to Gulf Coast regions ravaged by hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

"We wanted to bring a community of friendship. We wanted to share the grief, but we also wanted to restore some sense of joy and love of life, give them a little bit of enjoyment," said Rob Hartley, IE 00, associate minister of Campus Christian Fellowship at Georgia Tech.

Coordinated by the nondenominational campus organization, the five-day trip in mid-October brought together about a dozen alumni and 230 Tech students.

This was Campus Christian Fellowship's seventh trip to the Gulf Coast since hurricane Katrina struck. About 20 people volunteered during each of six weekend trips. The group also had 85 volunteers at Alexander Memorial Coliseum, where Georgia Tech housed nearly 300 hurricane evacuees in the days after Katrina hit the Gulf Coast on Aug. 29.

Much of the work during the fall break trip consisted of gutting houses, ripping out drywall and moving furniture onto front lawns in Pascagoula, Miss., and Slidell, Covington and Metarie, La.