Alternative Spring Break

Cockadoodledooo!!! At seven am we were all up and scrambling around to pack last minute and eat Rice Krispies. We hopped onto the broad street line plus a bus, and convened with another alternative spring break group from George Mason University in a community center located in way-north Philly. First the City Year organizers put in their spiel about the ten month volunteer core and then we did teamwork exercises and reflected on the week’s service. It was a little weird to accept the City Year hype and their own intense community while we were still in the “Go Campus Philly ASB” mood. The George Mason ASB group was very sociable and had spent the week following City Year employees, so they said cool stuff about the City Year rally and their fierce work ethic. After a corny video and an informative presentation I’ve decided that the core is an appealing after college opportunity. I especially like their emphasis on learning to respect people from a variety of different backgrounds. I am often intimidated and confused by conflicting messages about who to care about and who to ignore. It’s always motivating to hear that everybody has important things to share no matter how harshly they are judged.

The City Year role as workshop facilitators made a lot more sense after I realized that they didn’t sell tires. First, we paired up facing back to back to described a picture that our partner tried to draw, and then we formed four different groups according to “North, South, East, and West” characteristics — City Year’s “compass” of leadership styles. In those groups we planned an imaginary vacation. Speaking as a member of the South group (the empathetic, people-person kind of leader, it was kind of difficult to get anything done. Southerners may be easy to work with but when we were in a group all by ourselves it felt pretty dysfunctional. It was a pretty interesting experiment.

(Katie here) — I found the final reflection and discussion to be mostly valuable, although there were moments when it degenerated into self-congratulation for our “world-changing” week of community service. My sarcasm is only light — I really believe in what we did but it’s important to realize that it wasn’t much and needs to be followed with continued engagement. Especially for those of us at places like Haverford, it is all too easy to retreat back into our safe little suburban bubble and not confront these issues, but we are fortunate enough to be able to help and therefore we need to!

I liked thinking about the connections between different nonprofit experiences and trying to draw some conclusions…for example, one thing I gained from the week was an appreciation for the plurality of nonprofit groups. It’s important to realize that when you go into nonprofit work, you’re entering a network of organizations, people, foundations, etc. that have been working really hard before you got there. While innovation and creativity are vital for progress, you don’t want to reinvent the wheel. Collaborations and networking are an integral part of problem solving — for example, at Education Works we learned that they used the local church basketball leagues (which have been around forever) to model their own basketball league. One of City Year’s mottos was something to do with multiplying the power of everything they did, and recognizing the need to work with other groups and organizations with similar goals as opposed to going at it alone is definitely one way of accomplishing more.

We finished off the week with a yummy dinner at a nearby Italian restaurant. It was a wonderful experience and we are so thankful to Ian and Brittany’s fantastic planning skills leadership through, under, over and around Philadelphia. THANKS a bunch!

Thursday rolled around with lots of deceitful sunshine that made us think it was warm, when really it wasn’t! The group visited Fishtown Recreation Center to paint murals in their playground and back yard. The exterior was already covered with bright and cheery fish designs and inspiring words. It looked well maintained and we were greeted by a friendly and passionate organizer who seemed to really appreciate our help. We took care of a little graffiti, but spent most of our energies adding personal touches to existing murals and re-painting the peeling benches. They turned out Bee – YOU — tiful! Actually, mural painting is really hard and it made me feel like one of the five-year-olds who were playing inside the center because I was basically just scribbling on the wall. The weather got cooler as the morning moved on, but luckily we found a room inside to defrost our fingers. It was interesting to see the community’s varied use of the center. Little children filled up multiple classes and elderly ladies streamed in with baked goods to play Bingo. Our defrost room was filled with People magazines and pictures of Disney Channel Celebrities which prompted an interesting pop culture discussion — a continuation from the previous night’s Taylor Swift invasion.

At the end of the project it was cool to hear how the mural painting at Fishtown Rec has not only beautified the area for the residents and covered up graffiti that isn’t what kids should be seeing, but it has also drawn press attention to the site. This kind of positive publicity makes it less likely that the center will get cut (apparently budget constraints are forcing the city to close quite a few rec centers). After working hard, we took this lovely group picture. (We actually took it about seven times, our poor photographer was trying to juggle all of our cameras — this particular incarnation of the shot is courtesy of Sara, thank you! She is the one holding a bag over the head of the person in front of her. What a sweet girl. Hahaha.)

The remainder of the day was spent discovering the Tastes of Philly on a delicious Philly Food Tour. It was kind of amusing how many vegan/vegetaring/quasi-vegetarian/lactose-free people we had, sorry to the tour leaders who had to deal with all of us! It was a great tour, though. We stuffed ourselves to the point of comatose and then attempted to stay awake for a play in the evening — it was a one-man show entitled Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll that was definitely thought-provoking. Campus Philly did a good job of introducing us to Philadelphia, both its volunteer and entertainment opportunities –thanks!

On Thursday evening we proceeded to stay up way later than was intelligent given how early we had to leave in the morning — but it was our last night together and we couldn’t help it.

On Wednesday our first activity was a touristy one, not a volunteer experience — a winter tour of the famous (infamous?) Eastern State Penitentiary. It was definitely a winter tour; we were all very grateful for the mid-tour hot chocolate break. But hey, at least we didn’t have to live there! We all agreed that it was pretty creepy and strange to casually take a tour through a place where so many people lived in solitary confinement for so many years, and where many consequently went insane. I think that it was actually a really worthwhile place to take the ASB group because part of the reason the city decided to keep the prison open as a museum was to educate people about the issues that prisons still face today (overcrowding, mental health, and class issues for example). It was cool in the context of our “nonprofit tour” to learn about the prison reform group that worked to get it shut down, as well. All in all, a fascinating but freezing experience.

After lunch, we headed on to activity #2 of the day — working in a community garden (whose location I do not think I can reliably tell you — I just got on Septa and followed the crowd — northeast Philly perhaps?). The garden, part of a network of other similar gardens supported by an organization called Philadelphia Green (part of the Philadelphia Horticultural Society), employs teens from the neighborhood as well as providing some plots for community members to use for themselves. The food from the garden goes into local markets, corner stores, and restaurants. When “local food” means three blocks away, that’s pretty cool. My group worked with Hannah (a Haverford alum!) to dig up weeds and turn over the soil, trying not to decapitate too many worms in the process. A fun (and rather dirty) time was had by all, especially since the predicted rain showers didn’t come. As fun as mud is, it would have been a little gross to go on to activity #3 of the day covered in it…

…and activity #3 was a return to Germantown High School to work with Education Works again. It was great to see the same kids from the day before (some of us switched groups but I stuck with the 1st graders). Highlights included watercolor paintings of hearts, starts, and socks, reading a book about a dolphin in a bathtub, and teaching a girl about less than, greater than, and equals signs. The real highlights were their enthusiasm and smiles, though. However, those made it all the more sad to have to leave at the end and tell them no, we couldn’t be coming back the next day. The teachers and leaders at the after school program were inspiring and talented people with challenging jobs, but they could definitely use more consistent volunteer support (or for that matter, more paid staff — but budget freezes make that unlikely in the near future). As great as it is to get in there for a day or two and try to learn more about inner city education and meet the kids, this is the type of volunteer experience that really works best when you can make an extended commitment. Seeing the Americorps members there was a great example of how to go about that.

Our rather exhausted group headed to dinner (cheesesteaks on South St followed by delicious frozen yogurt) and then back to the hostel, where we may or may not have youtubed Taylor Swift music videos for a while. Shoutout to Zehra for the use of her computer. Anti-shoutout to Zehra for hijacking my facebook status.

Day 1: Sunday
Sorry this is getting off to a bit of a late start, but better late than never. On Sunday afternoon, we met 16 other ASB-ers (and our fearless leaders, Ian and Brittany) at 30th Street Station and headed to our lovely hostel, home for the rest of the week. After dinner, we played some ridiculous ice-breaker games and were the best of friends by bedtime. Bedtime, however, turned out to be after the rather early lights-out time of the hostel, so getting ready for bed in the dark was an adventure. We rested up in our bunks, readying ourselves for our first real day on Monday.

Day 2: Monday
Turns out the lights don’t come on until pretty late in the morning, either. Darn. Somehow we managed to dress ourselves despite this obstacle. After splitting into groups, we set off for our first destinations…half the group went to the Philadelphia Zoo first, and half went to MANNA first . At the zoo, we cleaned up lots and lots of trash (who really thinks it’s okay to leave dirty diapers on the ground?!) and were rewarded with a tour of the zoo. Personally, I liked the Giant Elephant Shrew the best. Others may disagree with me, I expect. Ingrid, for instance, liked the squawking otters. Around midday we switched locations. MANNA stands for the Metropolitan Area Neighborhood Nutrition Alliance – if you’re a Haverford student, you may know them by the delicious pies they sold us in the fall. This nonprofit delivers 3 meals a day/7 days a week to those living with life-threatening illnesses at acute nutritional risk. They almost completely depend on daily volunteers to do the labour and we were happy to help. Some of us assembled and packaged meals in an assembly-line fashion while others de-stemmed and chopped bags and bags and bags of basil. This seemed like a great organization where it’s easy to get involved – I would urge anyone in the area to don a sexy hairnet and help them out. Our evening was spent eating delicious Indian food, catching a movie, and continuing to bond with the other ASB-ers. It’s a pretty fun group; and I’m enjoying getting to know some kids outside the Haverbubble and even the Bi-Co and Tri-Co bubbles, especially those with shared interests in nonprofit work. The week has definitely gotten off to a good start.

Day 3: Tuesday
Hopefully everyone has become accustomed to the blue lights in the dormitories that flick on in the bedroom for ten seconds after every slight movement, and also to the rocking club right next door (although it’s no longer an issue midweek –we’ve been warned to avail ourselves of free earplugs at the Hostel counter when Thursday’s sleeping time comes around.) This morning we visited the Italian Market in the morning and then headed quickly over to Germantown High School, where Jason Weems of EducationWorks awaited us with a crash-course in urban education. Today was eye-opening – an example of how some volunteer work, like working in the kitchen at MANNA, is relatively straightforward, while others, like working directly with children facing a wide variety of obstacles on their path to success, require a lot more background information and skill along with the motivation to help. The former is a great opportunity for casual volunteering with immediately tangible results, while the latter requires a long term commitment of the body, heart, and mind. Our brief foray with both genres was exhilarating, informative, and exhausting. After working with kids from ages 6-13 and promising to return again tomorrow, we trudged back to our Bank Street Hostel with just enough energy to stuff ourselves with delicious Chinese Food. Our fearless leaders are remaining calm under the stress of leading the whole group around and are impressively effective: nobody has been left on Septa …yet. More to come tomorrow, it sounds like it’ll be a full day.

Peace and love,
Ingrid and Katie

Campus Philly and 20 local college students have decided against spending tons of money on airfare, hotels, and tacky souvenirs this Spring Break. Instead, they are planning to stay in the City that they know and love to focus on helping their local community.

Campus Philly has teamed up with eight great non-profits to create four, day-long service projects for enthusiastic student volunteers. Each project will have an active service and educational component, for a totally hands and minds-on experience. The week will conclude with a reflective leadership retreat where each project and the issue areas surrounding each project will be discussed. Of course, because it is Spring break, time is set aside each day to unwind, giving students the opportunity to explore both historic and cultural offerings within the City of Brotherly Love.