Gave a Year, Changed the World

A refelction on my year of service… This Blog Does Not Represent the Ideals of City Year 

City Year taught me to keep dreaming. Things may go wrong and fall apart, frustrations may run high, and plans may change. But in the end, as long as you don’t give up, everything works out in the end- often times far better than you could have imagined.

Four hundred thirty-two thousand minutes. Fifteen hours of ABC coaching per twelve or more focus list student. Seventeen hundred documented community service hours. That’s how you measure 10 months of service.

Spirit break after a powerful round of PT, and reading the daily briefing. After a while City Year culture became a way of life.

It encompasses data, dosage, tracking, khakis, teamwork, red layers, early starts, jolliness and power greeting. Its cover also reveals late evenings, frustrations, elevator speeches, Leadership and Development, service projects, stipends, LACY, tutoring, mentoring, and role modeling. Service beseeched us to answer Gandhi’s call to be the change we wish to see in the world, and Martin Luther Kings Jr.’s challenge to be great, because we could serve. Service also stirred our own devotions to the education cause- a devotion we belted loud and proud in our I Serve statements. Now that graduation has come to turn that signal light that has so long been green to red, we can take our well-deserved break and find comfort in knowing We Gave a Year and Changed to World.