A Week of Varied Service (Heroes Led)

This was another week of minimal contact with students, for the most part. The kids at Seabrook Middle School had their spring break this week but that didn't mean that we had the week to lie around. We had some things to take care of as part of GYSD wrap-up as well as some workshops and other projects. On Monday, we went to school to collect the tools we left there on Friday. We took them to Timberland's off-site storage – the first time I'd ever been there – and helped the Civic Engagement team with putting the tools away. The CE team is responsible for organizing corps-wide service projects and leading workshops for groups outside of City Year. My roommate is on the team and they have a fundamentally different day than I do. Still, it's no less important and it was neat to see them in their environment.

In the afternoon, the Seabrook team, as well as some corps members from the Hillside and Nashua teams, sat in on a workshop presented by the Right Question Project. The people from this group have been working for twenty years on changing the way education and mentoring is done. Instead of asking students questions to facilitate learning, we learned how to create a prompt to get students to ask questions about a topic. It sounds simple but requires an incredible amount of mental dexterity. It pushed us to our limits. However, I know that the students I work with are capable of using this process. It may take a few attempts but eventually I hope they will start critically thinking about the world around them.
Tuesday was a strange day. It had the same setup of a typical Friday but, obviously, it was in the beginning of the week. It made for a slightly confusing mindset but overall it was a successful day. We talked briefly about Saturday's Heroes Led service project. It will be similar to GYSD but with the actual Young Heroes leading the service projects – as the name implies. It will be interesting to see those students in action, since I've never attended a Heroes Saturday.

The final session of the day was the Seabrook team's Community Meeting. The theme of our Community Meeting was Renewal and the general flow of the pieces reflected the flow of a year of service. It started off light, with Ripples and Joys then flowed into an excellent Mocassins piece led by Amber. I had the chance to share my Life's Work. I talked about some elements of my childhood and the most pivotal eighteen months of my life, the ones that helped transform me into the person I am today. I tend to talk about myself a lot and I didn't want my piece to reflect an egotistical blowhard. I was pleased to hear from several people that it was very well done and actually helped them in their current situations. Diane talked briefly about all of the good that City Year has done in the Seabrook community and how members of that town have really stepped up to take care of themselves. It's reassuring to know that there are others there who support the City Year mission of transforming children and communities for the better.

We had a late start on Wednesday, so I got to sleep in much later than I usually do. The morning was spent preparing for our Dodgeball Tournament fundraiser at Seabrook Middle School. Bear organized it mostly to have something fun for students to do during their spring break. Unfortunately, we didn't have a huge turnout, but we did have enough to do a three round version of a Round Robin style tournament. Some members from the Young Heroes team and the Nashua WSWC team showed up to support us – many thanks to them! Overall, we raised $24 that we'll be donating to the Seabrook Middle School Student Leadership Club. It was a great way to spend our Wednesday.

On Thursday, the Seabrook team had our second team day. We headed up to Portland for a picnic in a park. Unfortunately, it was very windy so most people ate their lunch in the van. After eating, we headed back into New Hampshire to go candlepin bowling at an alley in Portsmouth. Chris treated us to ice cream at a really neat ice cream parlor in the city before we headed home. It was really neat to get out and enjoy the day.

That evening, I led a brief meeting about our end of the year fundraiser that Allie, the Resource Development Project Leader, has been helping us organize. She was out of town for the week and wanted me to step up and take care of it. It's the kind of stuff I'll have to do a lot of next year and I'm glad that I get the chance to practice now.

Friday was a day like two weeks before – a day of prep for a big service project. The Young Heroes had their Heroes Led Service Day on Saturday and the rest of the site helped out. The neat thing about the day was that the actual Young Heroes were in charge of various pieces of each project. But before we got to Saturday, the City Year corps members had to prepare the various sites for service. I spent most of the afternoon attempting to chalk out a map of the United States on a blacktop at an elementary school in Nashua with a few other corps members. We were utilizing a grid to do it pieces, but it was incredibly difficult. The chalk wasn't very visible with the sun beating down on the blacktop and I didn't want the map to look crummy. I was standing, just starring at the northeast, unable to do anything but stare. Thankfully, we all were able to work together to finish it. I was proud of the work we did but not too pleased with the sunburn I got.

I usually don't serve on Saturdays with the Young Heroes program, but this Saturday was different. The whole site went out to Nashua for the Heroes Led service projects and it was amazing! One of the Young Heroes, "Daniel," remembered me from his visit to Timberland way back in September. A few Young Heroes had come out for a panel discussion with us new corps members about what it's been like to be a Young Hero. I was really surprised that he remembered me. It was humbling; I was reminded of our ability to have an influence on others without even realizing it – both as City Year corps members and human beings.

The actual service project was great. Daniel, another Junior Team Leader, Ryan (a corps member from Young Heroes) and I went to the park that our group would be cleaning to prepare the site for their work. While waiting, Daniel and the other Team Leader hung out on the playground. A little girl from the neighborhood came over and started playing with them. I sat back and took notice of the greatness of the moment. Here were two young high schoolers interacting with a child and thinking nothing of it. If they had had red jackets on, they would look like any other City Year corps members. The moment got even better when the rest of our group arrived. After watching us clean up garbage from the park for about twenty minutes, the little girl picked up some gloves from our bucket, put them on and started helping out the Young Heroes with their service. It was beautiful. The two moments together exemplified what we want our service to do: recruit young people to our mission, transform communities and mindsets for the better and inspire other young people to take on the mission for themselves. What I saw on Saturday was not just the future of City Year in a microcosm, but the future of our country and our world: a place where human beings do good for each other simply because they can.

P.S. City Year is in the running to win $250,000 from Pepsi as part of their Pepsi Refresh project. If you want to help us get that money, you can vote here. Remember PITW #107: We Are All Fundraisers.