Care Force Chronicle- Milwaukee, WI

By Emily Kean
Partner: City Year Milwaukee
Volunteers: 150+
Service Partner: South Division High School
When: January 13-18, 2011
TCF: Emily Kean, Dan Nemiroff, Florence Capinding, and Dylan Morrill

During our week in Miami we found out that Dylan, Dan, Flo and I would be traveling to Milwaukee to help support City Year Milwaukee (CY MKE) prepare and execute their Martin Luther King Jr. Service Day (MLK Day). I knew it would be hard to adjust to the snowy temperatures we were about to endure in Wisconsin, however, I was looking forward to being back home in the Midwest. Our flight out of Boston was actually cancelled on Wednesday because of a snow storm in the Northeast so we had to miss a day of prep; however, we arrived Thursday evening ready to work.



City Year Milwaukee Physical Training.

 On Friday morning, we joined CY MKE in Unity Rally which definitely brought us back to our days as corps members. Their Physical Training was intense and definitely demonstrated the discipline and excellence that this site strives for in their service. Unity Rally took place in 4 inches of snow outside of South Division High School which was the service site for MLK Day. South Division is located south of downtown Milwaukee and has a City Year team that serves their year around keeping students in grades 9th-12th in school and on track to graduate. Our day was spent leading corps members in PC trainings and prep work. Most of the projects that were planned involved painting so we had a lot of sketching to do for murals throughout the school.

Maurice Turner, Principal of South
Division High School, welcoming
volunteers and City Year. 

On Friday evening we joined the staff and senior corps members of City Year Milwaukee at McBob’s Pub and Grill and spent time getting to know them over a Wisconsin fish fry! On Saturday and Sunday, we worked with Chelsea Pretz, Civic Engagement Senior Corps Member, and Emily Gorenz, Program Manager, to help finish up all of the prep work with several dedicated corps members. All of Team Care Force was impressed by the CY MKE corps members’ willingness to put in extra hours with a smile even after a long week of service in their schools. The staff and corps members at City Year Milwaukee were all excited and interested in learning how to do physical service.



Before



After

On Monday, City Year Milwaukee was joined with over 200 community volunteers to serve in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. at South Division High School. Volunteers came from Marquette University, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Frito Lay, Starbucks, and different Greek organizations, including Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. and Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc. The Principal and several students from South Division also came out to help beautify their school. While helping to build a “beloved community” we painted over 50 murals throughout the school in classrooms, hallways, and on canvas. This day reminded us all that people from diverse backgrounds can come together for a common cause and serve! Special thanks to City Year Milwaukee for hosting us, specifically, to Chelsea Pretz, Civic Engagement Project Leader, Bryon Anderson, South Division High School Team Leader, and Lauren Feaster, Rogers Street Academy Team Leader, for your hospitality!



Before



After



 

Care Force Chronicle - Miami, FL

By Phillip St. Clair


Partner: Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life
Volunteers: 86
Service Partner: Lenora B. Smith Elementary School
When: January 4th – 7th, 2011
TCF: Aundrea Dean, Emily Kean, Dan Nemiroff, Phillip St. Clair; Program Manager Ken Wakwe, Project Manager Hugh Harlow, Deputy Director Wil Holbrook

After a relaxing holiday break and ever eventful New Year’s Eve activities, all the members of TCF were on a plane headed to Miami, Florida on January 2nd, 2011 to begin a new year in service. Aundrea, Emily, Dan, and myself worked with Hillel, a Jewish college campus organization to run an alternative winter break program. This trip was a different type of event where the volunteers participated in a half day of physical service and a half day of human service for a week. The 86 college age students rotated through different physical service projects at Lenora B Smith Elementary school.

Coming into this project I had no idea how a whole week of service would run. TCF is great at preparing for a week and then running a high intensity full throttle service day, but our team had not yet run a full throttle week. However, this service week proved to be a great experience and provided insight into the next Hillel project, an alternative spring break trip, that Emily Kean and I are leading in March. Thankfully we learned what worked and what needed some tweaking for the future.

With a group of 86 people working more than 860 volunteer hours that week, we were able to beautify and bring transformative change to the Lenora B. Smith Elementary School. We built, stained, and painted mural benches, cleared land for a 40’ x 60’ garden, and painted wall murals which were placed around the campus to bring life and enthusiasm to the halls. The schools’ mascot, “Edu-gators,” was painted in the halls and along the outdoor walkways along with stop signs to help teachers and students stay in lines. We also built planter benches to provide much-needed sitting areas around campus, and filled the music room with new murals to express more creativity. I was especially happy to improve the music classroom as it is such an important class for students and is being cut from so many schools.

The unique part of this trip was that after the physical service was completed in the morning, the students then visited two different after school programs in the surrounding community for the afternoon. Sixty-six of the Hillel volunteers visited Dunbar Elementary School to help students finish homework and/or play games. The other twenty Hillel volunteers visited Overtown Youth Community Center where they were able to work along with the staff of OYC to engage their students in new activities and lessons. Each volunteer was encouraged to work with the same 1-2 students each day to bond and build relationships. By the end of the week, this was by far the favorite part of many of the volunteers' service experience.

Our team was able to stay in South Beach for a couple of days towards the end of the trip. It was phenomenal to walk around the strip after a successful service week. By the way we were strutting around; you would have thought we owned South Beach. We had great suggestions for where to eat from our teammate Dan, who served with City Year Miami last year, and got a good feel for that part of Miami. We even got to see where some of the folks from the TV show, The Jersey Shore, went out for a “chill night in South Beach”. Being able to commit a week’s worth of effort, time, enthusiasm, and energy made me truly appreciate the work we do and the partners who make it possible.

Care Force Chronicle-Miami, FL

By: Florence Capinding

BUNN emplyees installing

gutter systems around

buildings at Troy Community

Academy.



Partner: BUNN

Volunteers: 130

Service Partner: Troy Community Academy

When: January 2-7, 2011

TCF: Georgia Lawrence, Steadman Graves, Dylan Morril, Florence Capinding; Project Manager Susan Bensen, Project Manager Huw McDonald.

Reserves: Meghan O'Toole Strategy Analyst at City Year Headquarters; and Taylor Ferguson Development Manager at City Year New Hamphsire.

This was my first Care Force trip for the year 2011. And what better way to transition from winter break and back into service than having an event in beautiful Miami, FL! Susan, Georgia, Dylan, Steadman, and myself were joined by reserves Meghan O'Toole and Taylor Ferguson. This was our first Care Force event sponsored by BUNN, an international company that designs and manufactures in-home coffee brewers and commercial beverage equipment. Care Force and BUNN collaborated to serve at Troy Community Academy.


City Year Staff member,

Meghan O'Toole distributing

paint to volunteers.



Troy Community Academy (TCA) is a Miami-Dade County Public school and Department of Juvenile Justice Day Treatment Program. TCA provides supervision and education to at-risk youth and also runs a successful horticultural program which teaches students the techniques and benefits of growing their own fruits and vegetables. Each week students sell their crops at farmers markets, allowing them to interact with the community and to earn extra money. In addition, the school operates the award winning Teen Cuisine Restaurant which is run by a TCA teacher with students from the school. The students learn how to prepare meals, gain work experience, and earn a stipend. The Teen Cuisine menu is anything but plain. They offer a variety of choices including hamburgers, jumbalaya, buffalo wings, and seasoned fries to name a few. TCA is truly a remarkable school.




The majority of our projects for the event were designed to enhance and improve the horticulture program at the school. During the preparation days before the big event, the team was busy measuring and cutting wood, sketching murals, and hunting for cardboard. Yes cardboard. Ben Thacker, the horticulture program director taught us how cardboard could be used in gardens. The cardboard is placed on top of the grass around where the plants grow and then covered with dirt, compost, or mulch. This keeps the grass and weeds from continuing to grow and is a more eco-friendly method than using plastic or cloth because the cardboard breaks down naturally over time.



Teen Cuisine students prepared lunch
for the event.



On Thursday, the event day, we quickly learned how great BUNN employees are! They served alongside Troy Community Academy students and staff, and local community members. Everyone was self-motivated and always ready to jump into more service to improve the school. It was no wonder that we were able to accomplish so much in such a short amount of time. For lunch we all enjoyed delicious bag lunches provided by the Teen Cuisine restaurant.

We completed six projects that day which included:

• Extending the vegetable garden for the horticulture program
• Landscaping the perimeter of the entrance by planting 50+ native plants and shrubs.
• Constructing 5 picnic tables, 6 planter boxes, 5 mural benches, and 3 double planters.
• Constructing an outdoor classroom
• Painting 15 panel murals
• Repairing a green house and stone pathway; as well as installing a gutter system and rain barrel structure to collect rain water for the garden.



Troy Community Academy

students helping landscape

around the school.



BUNN employees repairing a worn-down green house.



I am confident that the projects completed by the 130 dedicated BUNN employees that day will be sustained by the students and faculty, and will leave lasting benefits for the school and community for years to come.