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On MLK day, I worked on the Coalition for Independence project. It was fun helping improve toys to make it easier for kids with disabilities.Along with sanitizing them so no germs would not spread. It was really cool to know that this would help others and have an impact in the community. It was awesome working and getting to know new volunteers that were working with me on this project as well. -Patrick Robey, 16  Add Comment I had a wonderful experience on MLK Day working at preparing a new Habitat for Humanity. Our service learning that day made me realize that there are a lot of people who go unnoticed for the things they do and the things they support. That day, I saw a lot of people I knew both famous and not and learned about their contributions to our community. - Kenyala Forbes; 15  I am beyond excited to join such an incredible team here at YVC. Being able to share what I am passionate about with people who are the future leaders of the world is an opportunity that could never be turned down. After a week working with the Team Leaders and the youth volunteers I can see their hard work and commitment to making a change in the world around them. This opportunity will be a challenge, an adventure and hopefully the most meaningful experience that I could ask for. My goals are to become more open minded, soak up as much information that I can and to allow myself to learn. I challenge the youth to become fired up and understand that their work now will shape one life and that makes a difference. After the completion of another successful Summer of Service followed by a short reprieve, the offices of YVCKC are once again filled with a flutter of activity. Program Director Chris Miller and former Team Leader turned Assistant Program Director Amanda Myer have assembled a new cast of AmeriCorps Team Leaders, each with a strong history of volunteerism and a commitment to Service Learning. They are:
A note from one of your new Team Leaders, Emily Lundberg: The energy and excitement for YVC coming from Chris and Amanda during our training contagiously spread to us as new Team Leaders. In response we have each jumped right into our new roles brainstorming, planning and coordinating ways to bring the youth of Kansas City together with their community. So far we’ve completed a training project at Unleashed, where we were joined by some truly inspiring YAB members, and lead our first Saturday project at Sanctuary of Hope this past weekend. While we begin to fill up our Saturdays with a diversity of new and re-occurring projects (stay tuned for sign-ups!) we are also anxiously awaiting the start of our In-School and After-School programs and our first official YAB meeting. It’s the start of a new year at YVCKC and every one of us is dedicated to making this year the very best year yet. We hope to exceed previous volunteer and project count numbers while also building stronger relationships with the agencies and schools we work with and continuing to add more. Our goals are lofty, but our passion is deep … and our office is in walking distance to a Starbucks. Nothing can stop us now! YVCKC is fortunate enough to have the help of five student leaders for our Summer of Service. The student leaders are sponsored by Bank of America Student Leaders program and devote eight weeks of their summer to helping the Youth Volunteer Corps headquarters and Kansas City Office as well as helping on our summer projects. Throughout the summer each student leader will share their stories and experiences serving in the Kansas City community. Peculiar, MO is a very small urban city with three gas stations, Subway, Sonic, Country Mart, and a few small businesses that never stay in business very long. Why is this important? Peculiar has been my home for the past seven years. It helped me utilize my passion for helping others through church and school-related community service, but it was nothing compared to the experiences the Youth Volunteer Corps has given me. For my first site I went to TurnStyles, a thrift store that supports a local human services organization. I came in not knowing a lot about YVC or the organization I would be working with that week of summer programming. At first I didn’t understand what ten volunteers, a Team Leader, and a Student Leader could do to make a difference inside a store. By the end of the week, however, I was hooked on shopping in thrift stores and working with organizations that create stores like TurnStyles to benefit a bigger cause. Throughout the rest of the weeks of the summer programming, I saw a visible difference in the work we were doing. By rearranging furniture and making it look more appealing, we increased sales, which not only benefited the organization, but it also helped out the purchaser. Walking dogs while at the animal shelter Unleashed! seemed like a meager task, but sometimes the only time to the animals can run around is when volunteers from organizations like YVC step in to help out. The most shocking one of all was playing dodgeball at Camp Empowerment, a camp for inner-city youth. If someone were to tell me that they helped out their community by playing dodgeball with a bunch of high school students, I would have laughed. But in reality, that is what we did. We gave inner-city students the chance to interact with people their own age, and we broke down the differences between us. When I really got to thinking about how much YVC has impacted my life in the past five weeks, I realized that my life was not the important one. If I was changed this much in just a few weeks, I can only imagine the impact these experiences have had on the Youth Volunteers, especially those that have been volunteering here for years! The Youth Volunteers have definitely been the best part of the summer. I have not only seen a change in my community, but I have seen a change in the youth that come from different schools, cultures, and backgrounds just to volunteer. If they were placed in a classroom together, some of them might have never spoken words to each other, but through the simple act of giving back, they are breaking down barriers. I feel so honored to help lead these youth and watch as they see what a difference they are making. I admire their commitment to making that difference even if it isn’t the “cool thing” to do. It is students like these that will change the world. It takes a special kind of person to dedicate one week, two weeks or even all eight weeks to making the place they live in a better place. I grew up knowing that there was a need for help in third-world countries, but I often forgot that there is a need in my own community. My biggest wish is that through the opportunities the Youth Volunteer Corps offers to the youth around the Greater Kansas City area is that they will understand that they don’t have to look far to make a difference. The opportunity could be just down the street from them. YVCKC is fortunate enough to have the help of five student leaders for our Summer of Service. The student leaders are sponsored by Bank of America Student Leaders program and devote eight weeks of their summer to helping the Youth Volunteer Corps headquarters and Kansas City Office as well as helping on our summer projects. Throughout the summer each student leader will share their stories and experiences serving in the Kansas City community. Wow! It’s already week five, and sadly, my summer with the YVC of Greater Kansas City is halfway over. If you would have asked me what my summer would consist of just two months ago, chances are I would have responded with “who knows?” I honestly I didn’t know what this summer would bring. I just finished one of the most prolific, fun, depressing and nerve-wrecking times a teenager will ever endure – my senior year. In the midst of a roaring senior year coming to an epic end, it had somehow slipped my mind that I had not only applied for the Bank of America Student Leaders program, but was selected and due to the first meeting in a couple of days! From the very first day, after having only met the team I would be spending the next eight weeks of my summer with, let’s just say… I was hooked! My fellow Student Leaders are amazing to say the least. All five of us are strong leaders, yet unique in the qualities we have to offer. As for YVCKC and YVC Headquarters, simply put, WOW! From the founder David Battey to Magie, an AmeriCorps Team Leader, and everyone in between, one thing is evident: NONE of them would be here if they weren’t guided by their benevolence and a knack to provoke change. I am lucky to be a part of a steam-rolling organization such as YVC that is demolishing social and economic barriers not only here in the Kansas City metropolitan area, but across the entire country! And doing so through SERVICE! I have really enjoyed myself while learning a plethora of things from this experience. I could definitely live without the early morning traffic commutes, blown tires, and cold lunch every day, but even the lessons I have learned from THOSE experiences (how to plan for traffic, how to change a tire and how to pack THE BEST cold lunches) have been useful. When asked what my favorite project has been thus far, I pondered, and after about two minutes of intense thinking I had to choose all of them! As cliché as that may seem, it only speaks to the experiences I have had thus far. Each and every project I have been a part of has been completely unique from the previous. I was able to show five teenagers working at an urban farm the exhilaration you get when getting a job done, and I have witnessed how Youth Volunteers’ lives can change when they are given the opportunity to help others. This has been an amazing journey that I didn’t expect the summer before going to college, but I am extremely grateful of this humbling experience, and get this… it’s only halfway over! YVCKC is fortunate enough to have the help of five student leaders for our Summer of Service. The student leaders are sponsored by Bank of America Student Leaders program and devote eight weeks of their summer to helping the Youth Volunteer Corps headquarters and Kansas City Office as well as helping on our summer projects. Throughout the summer each student leader will share their stories and experiences serving in the Kansas City community. It’s only week four of my Bank of America Student Leader internship – the halfway point – and I’ve already had a wide range of great experiences. I spent a week mulching a trail at the Sanctuary of Hope retreat center for their annual 5k run. The next few days, I developed close bonds with kids from low- income homes at the Head Start program. Last week, I harvested crops with Farmer Joe at J-14, an organic farm that gives food to shelters and food kitchens. These were awesome projects, but they only offer a glimpse of what YVC does for the greater Kansas City area. Their task sounds simple: gather teens from around the city to work on a variety of week- long community service projects that benefit the disadvantaged. At first, I didn’t understand why youth would want to volunteer during the summer—but that was before I met the amazing youth who serve with YVC. YVC is made up of a group of amazing people from different backgrounds, all coming together to do what they love: changing our community for the better. I decided to apply for the internship because of my dreams of climbing the ranks in corporate America one day and building partnerships with charitable organizations. I never imagined that I’d find a love for mentoring youth, a vast appreciation for social justice majors, and an ambition to eventually come back and work in a nonprofit. Throughout my teen years, I’ve been passionately involved in serving others. I’ve witnessed poverty in Belize and South Africa, and I’ve raised thousands of dollars for Haiti and Joplin disaster relief. YVC takes a different approach by choosing local projects that might not get many volunteers but desperately need the help. From daycares to thrift stores to farms, the work gives me a chance to connect with and impact people all across the metro area. It’s one thing to travel or send money to a third world country or disaster-stricken area; it’s another to serve the people in your own town, your neighbors and your friends. I’ll never forget how appreciative the workers at Sanctuary of Hope retreat center were for our work on the trail. I’ll always treasure the sense of relief the Head Start teachers had when they saw us playing with the kids, so they could crank out piled-up paperwork. I’ll cherish the satisfaction of watching Farmer Joe deliver our harvested crops to the home of an elderly couple. And I’ll be forever inspired by the enthusiasm that each Youth Volunteer brings to work each day. “When I pulled up to work on sign-up day at five in the morning, there was a line wrapped around the block of eager youth waiting to sign up for their projects,” Chris Miller, YVC of Greater Kansas City program director said about the day that YVCKC began accepting youth applications for its Summer of Service program. These are the youth who would give up their summer to volunteer. Youth who care more about making a difference than playing video games or hanging out at the pool. Youth who would wake up early just to be the first to sign-up for a specific volunteer project. Thanks to these youth, I can brag to my friends about having the best summer job ever! YVCKC is fortunate enough to have the help of five student leaders for our Summer of Service. The student leaders are sponsored by Bank of America Student Leaders program and devote eight weeks of their summer to helping the Youth Volunteer Corps headquarters and Kansas City Office as well as helping on our summer projects. Throughout the summer each student leader will share their stories and experiences serving in the Kansas City community. Coming to Kansas City and living in the suburb of Blue Springs, Missouri, I have lived inside a “Blue Springs bubble” and not noticed much of the community around me. I have experienced less fortunate countries, but I forgot the less fortunate in my home in America. People often talk about “changing the world.” Many people often see the solution as throwing a couple of dollars in the donation collection at church. This is where Youth Volunteer Corps has shown me that it is not about “changing the world,” it is about experiencing life for yourself and evolving into the person you want to become. Working as a Student Leader for Youth Volunteer Corps has provided me the opportunity and ability to motivate myself. I understand now that I control the direction I take and influence the directions of others around you. I am now coming to understand that the opportunities I have been given have shown me that in order to “change the world” I must empower myself and the others around me. YVC gives youth the opportunity to empower and strengthen their community. Every project offers the environment of diversity, realism and new experiences. Every person that volunteers is changed for the better, whether they acknowledge the difference now or realize the evolution later in life. YVC motivates students to ignite the fiery passions instilled within one another. Two weeks ago while working with Youth Volunteer Corps of Greater Kansas City at Sanctuary of Hope in the blazing hot sun, Youth Volunteers, Student Leaders and Team Leaders came together as a team and worked side-by-side mulching trails, planting flowers and revitalizing the nature center. It was not distribution of power, but instead empowering one another. We choose not to establish authority over the youth, but instead give them choices and influences to direct them in the way each individual wished to become. YVC is not asking for fast changes, we are asking for small differences, for examples, for motivators. It is not all about “changing the world,” rather it is about igniting and empowering every individual. YVCKC is fortunate enough to have the help of five student leaders for our Summer of Service. The student leaders are sponsored by Bank of America Student Leaders program and devote eight weeks of their summer to helping the Youth Volunteer Corps headquarters and Kansas City Office as well as helping on our summer projects. Throughout the summer each student leader will share their stories and experiences serving in the Kansas City community. My experience with YVCKC has been short but powerful in its effectiveness to display the importance of volunteering and giving back to the community that has raised me. I have lived in Kansas City my entire life. I have cheered for the Royals as they have continued their infamous losing streaks and find creative new ways to lose. I have toured the Federal Reserve Bank, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (shuttlecocks and all), and the World War I museum. I have shopped on the Plaza. Yet, through all these experiences, I failed to recognize the whopping 15.1% of people who live below the poverty line, the number of animals that go abused and neglected, the choices that people must make between getting medical care for a beloved pet or putting food on the table, and the buildings that remain run-down and even decaying, all within our community. All of this is what made my experience with YVC-of Greater Kansas City so powerful. The ability of the organization to introduce kids in the greater Kansas City community to the poverty surrounding them is what makes YVCKC a game-changer and maybe even a life-changer. My first project was at the Humane Society of Greater Kansas City where our group folded newspapers and towels, helped prepare race bags for the annual Dog-n-Jog, and played with kitties. Although these tasks may seem insignificant, the impact they had on the youth who got to see the kittens sleeping on the newspapers and cleaned with the towels was significant. During my week at the animal shelter, one Youth Volunteer decided that she wanted to do more to help those poor animals without a family. She told me and my fellow leader that she planned to organize a drive in her neighborhood to collect toys and leashes for the cats and dogs at the Humane Society. These are individual experiences, but collectively they convey one of the most important life lessons anyone can learn: that people can make one small corner of the world a better place and they can inspire other people to do the same. The fact that just showing a young girl the suffering happening in her community sparked a desire to help raises hope that the next generation will be one that gives back.  The following is a post by Dae Smith, one of YVCKC's Spring 2012 Project Management interns. Read more about Dae and our other intern staff on our Who We Are page. For the past couple of weeks, the in-school project I work on at KIPP Endeavor Academy with their community service club has been focusing all of their attention on cancer, specifically leukemia, by participating in the Pennies for Patients fundraiser. This fundraiser started with information on cancer and lessons on what it does to your body and what kind of cancer leukemia is. For instance, did you know that one in three people will develop cancer in their lifetime? Or, that leukemia affects more children than any other type of cancer? After learning about the disease, the symptoms, how it has the possibility to affect everyone, we moved on to activities to deal with the heavy weight of cancer. In-class activities are important and crucial here at KIPP, as leaving the school to go off-site for volunteer opportunities is not easy or readily available for the community service club. First, we played trivia to test the students on what they learned. They were split into different groups and asked a series of questions, racking up points along the way. This trivia game happened to fall on Valentine’s Day, so treats were awarded to all, but the actual winners got an even bigger prize: money. As a former proud owner of two little vintage piggy banks, when one fell and broke I gathered up all of the loose change, divided it into five bags and awarded it to the trivia team winners, to get their homeroom started in the Pennies for Patients Fundraiser. KIPP has eight different homerooms, for all of their students ranging from fifth to eighth grade. Each homeroom is named after a different university, to really emphasize the importance of a college education for these children. A bottle with the homeroom’s name has been placed in each homeroom to collect change for the Pennies for Patients fundraiser. After all of the lessons on cancer, the activities we did, and a visit from a woman from the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Kansas City, these students were ready to start raising money for the cause. There are incentives for each homeroom to win, an Olive Garden lunch for the winning homeroom, and other prizes, but the students also really learned how far the money they raise will go and are continually bringing in more. The fundraiser goes until the end of this week, so we do not yet know how much money KIPP will raise for Pennies for Patients, but we do know that they will be helping to further advance research in Leukemia, and help support people that are currently battling this disease. The Community Service Club’s participation in the Pennies for Patients fundraiser showed their ambition to learn and help their community. | Write for our blog!Feel free to email a post and picture to the team leaders so we can post it! ArchivesFebruary 2013 CategoriesAll |
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