Care Force Chronicle - Charleston, SC

Charleston, S.C. - 9.17.09 - By Grant Hooper

On September 17th, Care Force was lucky enough to host an event in Charleston, South Carolina with T-Mobile at the Trident Area Shaws Unit Boys and Girls Club. Two members of Care Force, Senior Project Manager Vanessa Meisner and Senior Corps Member Grant Hooper, along with 8 members of City Year Columbia prepared the project and led as project coordinators.

The Shaw Unit Boys and Girls Club is located on 22 Mary Street, in the heart of Charleston. While most Boys and Girls Club serve a variety of ages, the Shaw Unit has recently switched its programming to focus on local teenagers. The Boys & Girls Club has everything from mentoring and tutoring, to homework help, a basketball program, and a successful recording studio that is open to the youth. The studio was graciously donated by Carolina Studios to provide an outlet for the teenagers to express themselves musically with help from recording industry professionals. Another program they have is the “Reading Soul Mates” in which mentors encourage reading through library time, and provide homework help to children. The area in which the Shaw Unit serves is considered to be the 8th most dangerous place to live in America. Therefore the programming that the club provides is essential to the underserved youth in the area.

Prep week was a great time as usual but especially so because it provided a training ground for many of the City Year Columbia corps members. Out of the eight corps members that came on the trip, six were first year corps or first year senior corps members. We were able to help teach the basics of physical service including taping and tarping; mural sketching; and how to be an effective project coordinator. One story that stood out was the prepping of the T-Mobile Huddle Up Zone and adjacent computer room. During the prep, all of us were able to work in the same room as a team to complete a common goal. Since it happened on the first day it really helped set the tone for a successful week of prepping that utilized the strengths of the team.

Prep week flew by and before you knew it, event day was upon us. It was fun to see over 150 T-Mobile volunteers run off the busses full of energy and begin their day with some powerful PT. For a lot of the volunteers it was the highlight of their day as they were able to loosen up by doing jumping jacks, foot fires and front-side-backsides-fronts that prepared them for an energetic day of service. The volunteers were able to complete a lot of work that day including painting murals in the gym, repainting both the floor and the walls in two bathrooms, painting two large outdoors murals, building benches and creating a teen specific room that served as the T-Mobile Huddle-Up Zone. One touching moment came at the end of the day when Michael Washington, a member of City Year Columbia, put the final touches on a mural in the game room with help from one of the girls that utilized the club.

It was a wonderful day that saw a huge transformation in nearly every room of the club. The T-Mobile volunteers worked hard and were able to leave the day satisfied with the service they had completed.

Care Force Chronicle - Bellingham, WA

Bellingham WA 8.28.09 by JoAnne Sylvia

This trip started with half of Team Care Force (myself, Cautchy Bailly, Susan Bensen and Grant Hooper) congregating at Gate 34 in Logan International airport for an extremely early flight from Boston to Wisconsin. During our layover we were sure to purchase some Wisconsin Cheese which was enjoyed by all. When we arrived at the Holiday Inn Express we met up with Care Force Program Managers Chris Farr and Vanessa Meisner. We were also fortunate enough to have Hannah Bratton, Sandy Jackiewicz, Jeremy Bleier, and Joe Dzerkacz from City Year Los Angeles serving on the event as well.

Our first day of prep work began with a tour of the Bellingham Boys and Girls Club. It is an after-school oasis in the middle of an industrial neighborhood filled with factories, warehouses and a large low-income housing development. We had the opportunity to sit down with the staff and learn about the kids that attend the Boys and Girls Club. You could feel the passion the staff had for the youth in their community.

Once our Home Depot order and Care Force 2 arrived, we got straight to work. The next few days were a blur of taping, tarping, cutting wood and organizing tools. Wednesday started out with a visit to a T-Mobile call center. It is a high energy and an employee friendly facility; it was easy to see how our partnership works so well together. Following the tour we headed back to the Boys and Girls Club and met up with our T-Mobile co-Project Coordinators. We were lucky to have a very motivated and energetic group of Project Coordinators who were all psyched for the service day in just 18 hours! After cleaning up, we went to a pizza place that the B&G Club staff raved about, and then off to sleep dreaming of murals, hammers, and solo cups filled with paint.

After our 150 volunteers arrived we woke up the neighborhood with our powerful physical training and were inspired by government officials and the GM of T-Mobile. After physical training our eight teams got to work outside and inside the facility. I can honestly say that the courtyard outside was about 10 times as bright as it was when we started after the addition of playground graphics on the sidewalk; panel murals on the chain link fence; and brightly painted benches. The freshly painted gym was ready for action with purple mountains majesty and action silhouettes of people running and jumping all around.

The much anticipated unveiling of the Huddle-up Zone was AWESOME. The group of Club kids had to be pulled out of the Zone later that afternoon so they could close the facility! The presentation of a check for $10,000 brought tears from everyone in the room and Linda, the director, was seen carrying the large check around for the rest of the day. We had a long, strong circle at the end of the day which included the B&G Club staff members, and we were all given membership cards to the Boys and Girls Club! Everyone enjoyed the opportunity to serve there and shared a mutual appreciation of all the hard work.

Team Care Force 2010!

Care Force is excited to announce the arrival of Team Care Force # 3!

Team Care Force (TCF) is two months into their Senior Corps Member year, where they are based out of City Year’s Headquarters for Idealism in Boston. Less than six days into their journey, they were already in the air traveling to new and exciting places for their very first Care Force service events. Half of the team flew 358 miles to Baltimore, Maryland, while the other half flew 1,643 miles to Wichita, Kansas, where they joined up with 3 former TCF members, Alice, Amy, and David. There may have been some bumps and bruises (both figuratively and literally) that came along with the first trips, but all in all, the events were a great success! Since then, they have had the opportunity to travel to Indiana, Maine, Missouri, Washington, and are currently in Toronto and South Carolina.

The team is comprised of seven youthful, energetic, and excited Senior Corps Members, affectionately nicknamed the “River Guides of Idealism”. These “River Guides” are ready and willing to steer volunteers in the right direction in order to have successful and rewarding experiences through their service events. The liveliest team member is Cautchy Bailly at 18 years old. He served in City Year Boston last year as a corps member on a Whole School Whole Child (WSWC) team. The second senior corps member is Kimberly Ferguson, a 22 year old from Tennessee, who also served on a WSWC team in the City Year Boston corps last year. Next up is JoAnne Sylvia who just turned 23 years old and served in the founding City Year Miami corps as a corps member on the Civic Engagement and Young Heroes Team. Susan Bensen, a 23 year old, comes to the team from City Year Greater Philadelphia where she served as a corps member on a high school WSWC team. Grant Hooper is also 23 years old and joined the team all the way from San Antonio, Texas, where he served as a first year senior corps member for the City Year San Antonio Civic Engagement Team. The sixth senior corps member on Team Care Force is Andrew Duffy, a 24 year old who served in City Year Boston on the Young Heroes Team. The final member of Team Care Force is Ken Wakwe, who is 24 years old and comes to us after being a first year senior corps member of a WSWC team out of Little Rock, Arkansas.


The team is incredibly excited for the upcoming year; so please, join us here to read about Team Care Force, their service, and all the volunteers that make a difference in our communities. We will also be going more in depth about each member of Team Care Force so you can learn about what makes each of them tick. You may even be in for a surprise or two! We hope that you may be inspired to build a bench or paint a mural in your own local neighborhood. Thank you for all of your support, and we will “e-see” you soon!