Just attending classes and playing sports doesn’t satisfy Kyle Jeffers.

The senior center on the Oregon State men’s basketball team took advantage of his time in college and began his goal to change the world.

He has been a mainstay on the court since arriving from Santa Rosa, Calif., three years ago but Jeffers will be known just as much — and maybe more — for what he’s done off the court.

“In my 23 years of college coaching I’ve never been involved with a young man who’s taken full advantage of his opportunity to be a student-athlete as much as Kyle,” coach Jay John said. “I’ve never seen it. He’s just a phenomenal guy in terms of giving his time.

“He’s still busting his tail in terms of academics and he still brings great energy to the basketball court. I tell you what, he’s going places.”

Jeffers has been part of several community projects before, but now he’s taking the lead on two big ones this season. He’s in charge of Operation Santa, where donations are gathered and shipped to troops stationed in Iraq during the holidays.

His girlfriend, Laura Beardsley, began the project two years ago. He always helped, but when there was no one to oversee it this year, he reluctantly volunteered.

Jeffers worried about the enormity of it until the Student Athlete Association Committee backed him throughout the fall term. That allowed him to expand the plan and gather donations from all the Pacific-10 Conference schools.

“This year I wanted to get the Pac-10 involved and all the different SAACs to join it,” Jeffers said. “I haven’t heard of anyone doing something like this. I thought it would be good to have a conference-wide effort.”

His goal is to fill 500 stockings to be spread out among 10 platoons, with letters of encouragement, toiletries, snacks, socks, T-shirts and games. There will be a group box for each platoon that includes sports equipment and DVDs of sporting events the soldiers missed.

Jeffers worked with the Pac-10 to get video of football games donated, and the OSU baseball office to have the College World Series chronicled.

“It’s a huge community project that takes a lot of time and effort from everybody to get it done,” Jeffers said. “It takes a lot of coordination and communicating.”

All the donations will be brought to the Club Level of Reser Stadium on Thursday, and there will be a packing party at 5 p.m.

More donations will be welcomed then, and volunteers may help the athletes put everything together.

“I can’t wait to finish,” Jeffers said. “I’m ready to focus on basketball now, and school. I’ve been extremely tired lately. I’ve been working on a lot of things.”

An annual project for Jeffers was planning the homecoming bonfire as part of the Student Alumni Association. This year it was a bigger effort with a concert.

Now that both those projects are done or in the final stages, it’s on to collecting 5,000 pairs of shoes for Nike to grind up and recycle. Nike uses them in its synthetic turf in stadiums.

Jeffers collected a few hundred pounds of shoes last year, but he set a higher goal this time.

This endeavor relates to his future career in sustainability, which is preserving the environment for future generations. He’s a business administration major, but learned about this aspect along the way.

“I think life has to change,” Jeffers said. “It will have to be implemented in everyone’s life. I like the idea. It’s new and innovative. It will change in the next few decades.”

Jeffers expects to finish his degree after the winter term, and has plans earn his master’s degree in Germany during the spring. He always wanted to study abroad and travel.

When that’s complete he’ll see if there’s an opportunity to play pro basketball in Europe. If nothing materializes, he’s ready to take on the world with his ideas and energy.

And OSU was his starting point.

“I feel I’ve been able to show that student-athletes can do more than play a sport and go to school,” Jeffers said. “They can get involved in many different ways.

“I’m glad I can help improve the student-athlete’s identity around the community, and show we are just as capable of getting involved as any other student. And hopefully, I can get others motivated. Some don’t understand the importance of it.”