Columbus Foundation Fellowship Programs

Everyone is closing up shop at their respective non-profits this week, but I spent a week this summer in Hilton Head, so fortunately I’ve still got one more week to savor at Per Scholas Columbus. But this will be my final blog post about my summer fellowship experience, so I figured I ought to find a way to wrap this all up. As I was putting together my final presentation for the our closing luncheon tomorrow, I came up with three “takeaways” that I’d like to share here.

• People are willing to help; don’t be afraid to ask. I’ve seen this to be true in several capacities. At the beginning of the summer, I really had no idea what to expect and I was not very familiar with Per Scholas. I remember asking on my first day, “Wait, what are middle skills?” And the questions just kept rolling. If my coworkers weren’t so willing to help me and show me the ropes, this would have been a long and painful perspective. I’ve also seen the inherent goodness of people when it comes to donors and employment partners. When employers hear about Per Scholas, they are typically more than willing to help us out with mock interviews or to speak to the classes. Many times businesses are willing to support us financially. I think a lot of times big businesses can get a bad reputation, but Per Scholas really benefits from their help, and all we had to do was ask!
• Community engagement is key. It’s hard to believe that I’ve lived in Westerville almost my whole life and I’m just now discovering the beauty that is Columbus. I was blinded by suburbia but I have seen the light. I loved getting to see this city up close and personal and to work with the people of this city to help improve their circumstances. I think that’s what it’s all about. Investing in your community, making it better, being fully present with those whom you are serving, that is the formula for a rich life.
• Everyone deserves a chance. A lot of times, people come through the doors of Per Scholas and they are awesome job candidates, but because of a gap in their resume or a bad break with a previous employer, they haven’t been able to find work. All they need is for someone to give them a chance and they are guaranteed to succeed. I think working at Per Scholas has made me much more willing to give people a chance, to give people the benefit of the doubt, because there is always more than meets the eye. If you give somebody an opportunity, there’s always a chance that they might waste that opportunity. But there’s an even greater chance that they will do something remarkable because of your willingness to trust them.

So that is what I’m walking away with this summer. It has been an incredible opportunity to serve and to grow. Many thanks to the Columbus Foundation, Per Scholas, Dan Sharpe, Melissa Neely, Rob Guentter, and each and every person who made this experience a possibility. It has been a bigger blessing than I can say, and I know that it has changed me for the better. I’ll be seeing you around, Columbus.

Much love,

Ashley

I am sitting at my desk, here in my third-floor cubicle at the Vineyard Community Center, for my final day as a fellow here. Yesterday, a new intern on our floor was being introduced to the third-floor tenants; it’s hard to believe that it was a full ten weeks ago, June 1st to be exact, that I was given the welcome tour. I have written at length on this blog about the warm, genuinely kind, and welcoming nature of essentially each and every one of my coworkers here. I seriously doubt that a more congenial and gregarious work environment exists in the Columbus area.

I have also used much of my 300 word weekly allotment to illustrate what I learned throughout the experience. To say my fellowship has been educational would be a callous understatement. In many ways it has been eye opening, and will pay dividends to my professional endeavors for years to come.

Thus, I will not divulge into any further redundancy; rather, I will discuss what lays ahead on the horizon for me. After I officially complete my fellowship tomorrow afternoon at the Columbus Foundation, I will have approximately two weeks before my 22 year tenure in Ohio’s Capital City will come to a close. I was born and raised in this city. I have spent the entirety of my formative years here; never leaving its borders for more than two months in my life, but that will all change on August 24th. I will be moving to Philadelphia to attend law school at the University of Pennsylvania. I am absolutely positive that much of what I was able to learn here–both from the nature of my work and from my boss’ earnest lessons–will bear fruit during my time as a law student.

The Columbus Foundation Summer Fellowship was the only program, job, or opportunity I applied to for this summer. There was nothing else that I wanted to do more, and the timeline perfectly corresponded with my own schedule. I am so grateful I was selected and given the chance to embark on this ten week journey. Undoubtedly, the fellowship has created an indelible final memory in Columbus for me, a perfect capstone to my residence in the greatest city in the world. Thank you, Columbus, you will always be home!

Today is my final day with Make A Wish.  After I finish writing this, I’ll be cleaning out my desk.  This week I did a lot of small projects, including running the same cost analysis for 2014-2015 but breaking it down by months.

My favorite part of my week was presenting to the programs team yesterday.  I hope that I helped them  a lot.  My presentation sparked a lot of debate about the best ways to do things, which is exactly what I had hoped for.  I enjoyed hearing their side of things since they knew much more about the wish coordinating side of things than I do.  Sophia said she would like me to do the presentation sometime later this year for the entire programs team because she thinks it is important for everyone to know and understand.

MAW also tried to fatten me up during the last week.  Our Development Officer, John, got a Piada food truck to stop by and hand out free Piada sticks.  Development also had a two day meeting and brought back their leftover food.  Lots of cookies and Pita Pit.  There’s always food in this darn office.  Earlier in the year they had left over City BBq and I’m a vegetarian so two days in a row I had a heaping plate of mashed potatoes and mac and cheese.

I feel especially sad, as this is my second and final summer with Make A Wish.  I have learned so much from them.  I don’t really have many words for what I’m feeling because it mostly just feels unreal. I’ve grown so much from the timid development intern who didn’t know how to copy, use a phone, or leave voicemails that weren’t completely awkward.  I’m so grateful for this amazing experience.  I loved getting to know the fellows and thoroughly enjoyed all the people in the non-profit world we got to meet during our learning sessions.  Sophia was an amazing and supportive boss all summer.  I know I’ll never forget this experience.

Much like all of my past summer jobs, this internship came with the understanding that my salary was already pre-negotiated. I’ve always considered myself a pretty mission-driven rather than money-driven person, so my past work experience has usually involved either a passion of mine or a skill-set that I was interested in mastering. It’s not that I don’t appreciate money. In fact, I would say that as a student of political economics, I am acutely aware of the fact that in many ways, money defines us. However, because I’ve always taken positions in the past with pre-set hourly wages, I’ve considered my value as an employee to be roughly equal to any other person in my position. In other words, I’ve never been put in a position where I’ve had to look at myself and wonder, “What am I worth?”
The question hit me after I was given the amazing news last week that ECDI would be possibly be keeping me on as an intern. I knew from the beginning of these discussions that, if I were to be hired, I could not possibly get paid as much as I’m currently receiving from the Columbus Foundation’s generous support. From there, the question became: how much should I be paid if I stayed at ECDI? Like any child of the internet, I immediately googled the average salary of a grant writer and got nothing. Even taking into account the type of organization you’re working for, the city you live in and how long you’ve been doing it, the salaries vary dramatically. Accepting that google would give me no answers, I turned to my friends and family. I was torn by the fact that, while potential assistantships may come with tuition coverage, a hefty stipend and financial peace of mind, they could never give me the satisfaction of working for an organization I truly believe in. Luckily, when the time came to discuss my salary with Tammy, I was comfortable enough to voice this concern and we were able to work out the hours and rate needed for me to say at ECDI long term. For the first time, I felt more like a professional than just an employee or intern. I’ve realized that, while I still don’t I have a definitive answer to the question “What am I worth?”, I definitely think it’s a question we’re all worth enough to ask.

It is hard to believe that I am in week ten of ten of my summer fellowship with the Columbus Early Learning Centers. Although the fact that I will be continuing as a part-time volunteer coordinator might be contributing to this feeling of disbelief, time definitely flew at the CELC this summer.

In a previous post, I mentioned that I had scheduled several large groups to come in to the CELC for service projects later this summer. Since many of these will not be coming in until after the completion of the fellowship, I wanted to take this opportunity to highlight the work that these groups will be doing. Later this week for my last blog post, you all can look forward to reading about the work of a couple of our individual volunteers.

John Glenn Civic Leadership Council (August 23^rd)-The John Glenn Civic Leadership Council will be bringing approximately forty volunteers for a volunteer day in late August. Since there are so many volunteers coming with this organization, they will be working on a variety of projects throughout the center. They will be painting an accent wall in our new triple office, designing new bulletin boards for each of our classrooms, giving our kitchen a makeover, and moving items out of a storage room to make space for a new teacher resource room.  This organization will also be partnering with the CELC throughout the academic year to work on numeracy in each of the classrooms.

Community Commitment 2015 (August 29^th)- For the first time we are partnering with Pay It Forward at Ohio State to bring Community Commitment 2015 to the Columbus Early Learning Centers. Volunteers will complete the storage room project that the John Glenn Civic Leadership Council is starting so that we can begin work on our new teacher resource room. In addition, they will be laying a fresh coat of mulch on our preschool and toddler playgrounds and creating enrollment packets for fall 2015.

United Way Columbus Volunteer Challenge (September 9^th)- Every year, the United Way of Central Ohio hosts a weeklong event of service called the Columbus Volunteer Challenge in which they pair business and leadership groups with nonprofit organizations and governmental agencies throughout Central Ohio. Once again this year, we will be partnering with the United Way for Columbus Volunteer Challenge. However, this year, rather than having a business or leadership group serve at our center, the CELC will host the United Way’s Leadership Givers for an evening service project. These volunteers will be making improvements to our literacy center, decorating nap boxes, and painting an accent wall in each of our classrooms.

As you can see, these volunteers will have the opportunity to have a meaningful and visual impact on the organization. Stay tuned later this week to hear about the projects of our individual volunteers.

One of my many jobs at Habitat For Humanity MidOhio this Summer has been converting all of the old news clips where Habitat was featured onto our newly founded Vimeo page.  Yes, this task was rather long and taxing, but ultimately it gave me the opportunity to learn more about my non-profit before my time here.  These news clips have basically acted as a story book or documentary of the past few years in this organization.

What you learn from watching these sort of clips is how consistently they have been able to help the surrounding communities and revitalize certain neighborhoods.  It is easy as a non-profit organization to develop goals and aspirations when you first found it, but putting those words into action is where things become difficult.  But looking back at these videos has shown me that Habitat For Humanity MidOhio has had a prominent presence throughout the past decade in Central-Ohio.

Below are some of the videos that I converted as part of my duties here as the video services specialist.  Please take a look and appreciate this video proof of why my non-profit organization is so cool!

Yesterday, President Obama released his new climate plan — one that the New York Times describes as “tough, [but] achievable”. The President, who turns 54 today (HAPPY BIRTHDAY BARRY O!), outlined his plan to crack down on carbon dioxide pollution from power plants. This plan puts an emphasis on the use of carbon-free energy sources like solar power and wind and is already drawing backlash from certain members of Congress. While the plan isn’t directly related to reducing harmful emissions produced by vehicles, it provides an opportunity for me to reflect on why the mission of Clean Fuels Ohio is important.

It’s 2015 and we are still *sort-of* having a debate about whether or not the climate is changing at a faster pace due to pollution caused by humans. Depending on who you ask, anywhere from 97 to 99 percent of credible scientists back the statement that humans are directly responsible for causing rapid climate change. Some people have a problem calling it “global warming” citing colder temperatures but semantics aside, it’s a virtually undeniable fact that power plants built by humans and vehicles driven by humans have been having a negative impact on our environment. How men and women running our government can continue to deny these facts is beyond me, but that’s a different story…

President Obama obviously faces more criticism on climate change than we do here at Clean Fuels Ohio, but the skeptics are out there. How long until people accept that protecting our planet IS a valid reason to change our behavior? It’s all well-and-good to change based on political pressures, or economic reasons, or business competition, but why is the environment seemingly an afterthought? NEWS FLASH: we have one planet — and we are destroying it. Whether or not you change your behavior because on politics, or business, or economics is fine by me, but I encourage everybody to start taking the environment a little more seriously.

Protecting our planet IS a valid reason to change our behavior.

Nine weeks of the summer fellowship is in the books. One week left. Where did the summer go? In hindsight, it has been a productive, didactic, albeit short, experience with the Vineyard Community Center.

In this penultimate work week, I completed one of my two fellowship projects–the development of an instructional  volunteer workbook–and I invested a significant amount of time preparing an interesting naturalization case. In this particular case, the newlyweds happened to be just a few months older than myself, which sparked some personal reflection. The bride is a natural born American, however the groom immigrated to the United States for college; their paths fatefully crossed while pursuing their education, and following a presumably Disney-esque first two years together, they decided to get married. Of course, the groom, not being an American and only in this country on a temporary student visa, must apply to become an American, a process known as naturalization, in order to permanently stay in the States.

The naturalization process is a long and burdensome one. In an effort to deter “citizenship marriages”– where a couple gets married and files naturalization paperwork solely for the purpose of naturalization, and after successfully achieving their goal the couple divorces and moves on–the United States government has created a cumbersome process for those seeking to gain citizenship through marriage. The government does not want to be taken advantage of, but simultaneously, it wants to provide an avenue for citizenship for those couples who are genuinely married. Thus, the burden of proof of marriage is enormous and must be satiated with a myriad of evidence. The number of requisite forms that necessitate legal assistance is also quite impressive, and I had the fortuitous opportunity to work on all of these forms this past week. Subsequently, I sat in on a meeting between the couple and my boss, where I was able to put the faces to the names. Invariably upon meeting the clients that I completed some casework for, I feel an immense sense of satisfaction in my work. Although the majority of it is done on a laptop in an impersonal cubicle, it is making a profound impact on the lives of real people, who have pressing problems that we are helping assuage. The casework is ongoing, again, the reality of this sort of work is that there are rarely any opportunities for instant gratification, but it was an inspiring way to complete my 9th and penultimate week as a Columbus Foundation Summer Fellow.