City Year- Day 69

Another day another project...

Yesterday was our last day working with City Year DC.  It was bittersweet.  To be honest, at first City Year was not my favorite project, but after actually seeing how truly  the kids enjoyed us being their and how fun the city year corps members were it turned out to be fun.  Granted I could never do a full term of service with them and am sooo glad I am an NCCC corps member but I'm glad we got placed with CY (city year).  Although 3 of my teammates did love it so much that they threatened to abandon us and stay with CY for the rest of the year.  They all want to apply next year for city year terms.

With this project, our housing was with Falls Presbyterian Church in... you guessed it, Falls Church, Virginia.  It was Beautiful. Our team has been spoiled.  We didn't get beds or anything, but we got multiple bathrooms and a kitchen and they cooked for us one night... it was great.

p.s.  Back at campus our team has the nickname "the NCCC Darlings" since for some reason or other they love us and we are photogenic so we are good at standing in the back of important pictures... hint hint. More about that to come.

CY corps members even have PT kinda like us.... okay not like us.  There pt is to let the community know who they are.  But they get into formation like us...

Back to City Year. Anyway.  So we worked for them for a total of 3 weeks. 

Week 1= in the schools.  We were all split up between elementary or middle schools, so we all had varying experiences of love and hate and overwhelming exhaustion.  The overall emotion however was satisfaction.  I personally worked in Malcolm X elementary school in Southeast DC which has one of the worst proficiency rates and worst behavior of kids in the DC area.  It was interesting.  I was working in a 2nd grade classroom and broke up many fights which was so sad because these kids were so great.  I couldn't understand how they were learning anything since they were running around half the time and just wanted attention.  They were wonderful though, really don't misunderstand me when I say that these kids had behavior problems because they did but they had other issues that brought that out.  

When I first went into the school I didn't think any of the kids would care who I was or what I was doing there, especially since I was just popping in for such a short period of time (3 days).  But on the 4th day when I had a training meeting in Malcolm X, I happened to walk passed a classroom with my kids they saw me and all ran out and jumped on me and hugged me.  They were so happy to see me and to show me what work they were doing and to claim me as "their city year".  It was crazy.  And even just yesterday the actual City Year corps member that works in that classroom said that some of the kids including London (below) were asking when I would be coming back.

This is my 2nd grader London.  I loved her. I was going to try to kidnap her and put her in my spike bag.. but then I thought better of it.

nap time!

Week 2= Week 2 was the kids spring break from school, so we helped run an alternative spring break with City year.  This included classes like fine arts, arts, PE, and education for kids from multiple different schools k-8.

The theme for CY camps was "Time warp".  Each day had a different theme, with lessons centering around them.  Monday- Prehistoric (dinosaurs, fossils etc), Tuesday- Greek Gods/Goddesses, Wednesday- Medieval, Thursday- Coming to America, Friday- Future

To help with camp we did a lot of prep work... painting, drawing, arts and crafts etc.

Then during camps we all had assigned jobs.  Some people were teachers, some were team leaders, some were behavior officers, and some were runners (bringing supplies- me!).

and then...

Week 3= our final week. We helped prepare for City Years Atlantic Media Day of Service.

This meant more prep work of painting, training, leading volunteers on the actual day etc.  However this time we worked with adults which was a MAJOR difference after working with those rambunctious kids for a so long.  We also chipped all the paint off a house to prepare it for a painting crew that was coming in this week to paint a mural on it.  The house is used as an after school hangout for kids.  City Year does a lot of beautification projects in order for places to look more enticing and fun to hang out in or to learn in.

I have a great team.  It's a love/ hate relationship but they're great.

DInner. 

Millena is a little homesick

So after all that, it turns out that even City Year liked us and said they'd miss us, so they gave us their boots as a way to remember them!  They also gave us a bunch of sentimental stuff thats hard to explain but it really meant a lot.  I liked that bunch.

p.s. I don't have time to explain the darlings, or my big fire news, or my sister weekend to NYC right now, but I will. so stay tuned.  This has just gotten cray. :) I'm a dork through and through.

Miss you all! XOXO