Columbus Foundation Fellowship Programs

Friday concluded my first week as a fellow at the Columbus Early Learning Centers.  While I am just beginning my journey here, there is another group that is finishing their journey.  Friday morning, I had the opportunity to witness the graduation of seventeen four and five year old children, who will be moving on to Kindergarten this fall.  It was moving to see the smiles of the children and their family members as they received their diplomas, marking one of the earliest of many milestones on their educational journey.  At the conclusion of the ceremony, I found myself in tears of laughter as the children looked with distress as their family members encouraged them to throw their caps in the air.  It was clear from their expressions that the seventeen four and five year olds found this to be a ridiculous request.  Nevertheless, some of the caps did go flying, and the ceremony way a success.

Before I go any further, I should introduce myself.  My name is Alex Downie and I am going to be a fourth year student at the Ohio State University majoring in Political Science.  After graduation, I plan to attend law school and hope to go on to do legal work for an interest group or nonprofit organization.  For this reason, I am incredibly excited to be working at the Columbus Early Learning Centers (CELC) this summer as a fellow, where one of my overarching projects will be to create a volunteer program.  The CELC is an organization committed to providing affordable child care and education with a focus on responsive caregiving, intentional teaching, community collaboration, and promoting a healthy and active lifestyle.  Although I have considerable experience volunteering and coordinating volunteer opportunities through my university, I have never had the opportunity to work with volunteers on the side of the service organization, and am thankful that the Columbus Foundation and The CELC is proving me with this opportunity.

Over the past week, in addition to working on and witnessing the graduation ceremony, I have been able to sit in on several of the classrooms to learn more about the organization and the people that it serves.  In addition, I have started developing the volunteer program.  I am now in the process of drafting a volunteer manual, researching legal requirements for bringing volunteers into a childcare facility, and have been gathering information on methods of recruiting volunteers and ideas for possible service projects at the facility.  I hope to have much of this initial preliminary work finished over the next few weeks so that we can begin to bring in volunteers by mid summer.   Please stay tuned to this site as I provide weekly updates into my journey at the CELC.

(Note: The postings on this site are of my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Columbus Early Learning Centers)

Hi, my name is Bryn Webster, and I think economic development is neat. I know, that probably sounds kind of nerdy, but when I heard about the Economic and Community Development Institute (ECDI), which supports small businesses right here in Columbus, I knew it was my kind of place. Their mission of achieving economic growth and equality through education and affordable microloans is right up my alley, and it doesn’t hurt that they’re located in a gorgeously renovated brick schoolhouse that’s equal parts industrial and charming. From their Food Fort, which provides incubation space for local food trucks, to their Women’s Business Center, which offers training and assistance for female entrepreneurs, ECDI is on the front lines of the battle against poverty and economic inequality and I’m excited to be a part of it.

Home sweet home!

For the next ten weeks, I’m going to be working for the Development Department as an assistant researcher and grant writer. Our department, which is located on the “Garden Level” aka the basement, is responsible for securing all of the money that ECDI uses to fund its various loans and programs. As I learned by starting my fellowship in the middle of one of Development’s busiest weeks, grant writing is a face-paced, high-pressure job where creativity is key and the details can make or break you. Because this was such a big week for the Development Team, I was expected to jump right in and start laying the groundwork for future projects, which was scary at times but ultimately very rewarding. Working for Development is like being on the ground floor (or in this case the Garden Level) of real social and economic change.

Because who needs windows anyways?

Now, I know a lot of people wouldn’t relish the idea of sitting in a basement for the next ten weeks, sifting through economic literature and writing papers. In fact, when I excitedly told one friend that I’d be researching and writing grants all summer, they noticeably cringed. While it’s not everyone’s idea of a good time, I can honestly say that it couldn’t be a better fit for me. The feeling I get when I find the perfect source to cite for one of our proposals or sit in on a marketing class to learn how our programs are impacting the lives of women in our community, it’s indescribable. As I walk down the stairs to the Garden Level every morning, I know I have the chance to help people achieve their dreams and create economic prosperity for those least advantaged in our society. I think that’s pretty neat.

One week as a Columbus Foundation Summer Fellow is officially in the books, and I could not be any more satisfied with my match at the Vineyard Community Center as a legal intern with their Immigration Counseling Services. I have wanted to become an attorney since eighth grade social studies, and there are few opportunities I could be taking advantage of during the summer in between graduating from the best damn university in the land—The Ohio State University—and matriculating to law school in the fall that will help make this longtime aspiration a reality.

I was immediately immersed into Vineyard’s framework, and I have spent the past week learning the fundamentals of a pertinent legal software, immigration law jargon, the filing of relevant paperwork, and more importantly, the immigrants themselves. Many times, especially from an academic standpoint, emphasis is designated to documents and numbers, forgetting, or even disregarding, the people that are actually impacted. At Vineyard, our focus is, and rightfully so, with the actual refugees and immigrants in need of legal and pragmatic assistance. On my second day, I spent the better part of the morning and afternoon completing the paperwork for a client; later that day I got to meet her and sit in on the counseling session she had with our lawyer, Elizabeth Watkins, who is a wonderful mentor, effectively putting a face and story to the name in the documents.

The welcome balloon my coworkers gifted me with on my first day.

The entire staff at Vineyard has been incredibly congenial, welcoming, and just extraordinarily nice. I am greeted every morning with a myriad of wide smiles and exuberant, passionate chatter. I have never had the good fortune of being in a work place that is dominated by such sincere and kind individuals, and for that I am truly grateful.

I earnestly look forward to the new experiences, skills, and relationships I will gain over the next nine weeks, so stay tuned!

-Abdulrahman Alwattar

Hello everyone! I’m David Danesh and I just started my role as the Columbus Foundation Summer Fellow at KidSMILES Pediatric Dental Clinic. I just finished my third year at Ohio State where I am pursuing a major in microbiology, with minors in global public health and business. I plan to attend dental school in Fall 2016 after I graduate next year, and after, I will pursue a Master in Public Health. I’m leaning towards pursuing residency training in pediatric dentistry after dental school, as well. I plan to pursue a career in dental public health, where I can serve as a clinician and leader in public health policy.

This summer, I have the amazing opportunity to work full-time at KidSMILES Non-Profit Pediatric Dental Clinic supported by The Columbus Foundation. I’m so happy and excited with the opportunity to work at a clinic with the mission of providing access to comprehensive, high quality dental care and to be surrounded by such passionate staff and volunteers. Several aspects of KidSMILES make this clinic special. It offers very high quality care for only $10: no bills, fees, or anything. The equipment and clinic itself is top notch. The volunteer dentists and clinical staff are amazing.

Furthermore, KidSMILES also has a robust outreach program where clinic staff and volunteers visit schools, preschools, day cares, food pantries, community organizations in high-need areas. I will be coordinating and leading almost all of the outreach visits. Laura Zuber my direct supervisor and mentor for the fellowship has developed partnerships with local summer lunch programs providing lunch during the week and on weekends for families that qualify for free and reduced lunches during the academic year.

Also, my fellowship is absolutely perfect for me because it is very open-ended; there are several other projects I can work on this summer. One project is looking at expanding and creating new partnerships at different locations for the outreach program. I’m working on a list of community organizations that we can contact and partner with. I will be starting to work on a photo outreach brochure to highlight the different types of outreach we provide, as well as a photo journal that showcases the amazing work of the clinic and the outreach program overall. I also found data on free and reduced lunch program numbers at all schools in Franklin County and the surrounding counties to determine which schools to target for expanding our outreach program. These are just a couple of the projects that I’m working on, with a few more in the works.

It’s been awesome to work in the clinic full-time this week. I have shadowed plenty of dentists in different dental offices in private practice and hospital settings. However, immersing full-time and learning about the non-profit side of dentistry has been amazing this week, even just for a week. I take how awesome this week has been as a strong indicator of what will be a fun, engaging, and challenging summer!

Clinic waiting room

Clinic Selfie!

Hello folks! My name is Ashley McIntosh. I am a recent graduate of Mount Vernon Nazarene University, earning my B.A. in English with a concentration in Non-Profit Business Administration. This summer I have the incredible opportunity to serve as a fellow at Per Scholas, a nonprofit IT workforce development agency. Here’s a little bit more about the organization: Per Scholas offers free IT education and job training to underserved communities in Columbus and throughout the United States. The services that Per Scholas provides allow graduates to begin successful careers in the IT field, breaking the cycle of poverty through education and training.

Needless to say, I am beyond excited about this organization and everything it represents. But one of the things that I am most excited about is the passion I see in the classrooms of Per Scholas. Today I was able to sit in on a class and I’ve got to say, I have never seen a group of people more dedicated or more engaged than this group at Per Scholas. The students come from all different walks of life. I was amazed to hear about the variety of life experiences represented in one room. Some students are young and just starting their careers; others came to Per Scholas looking to change careers later in life. Despite their many differences, these students are united in their commitment to education. I’ve spent the majority of my life in classrooms and I’ve never been in a class more eager to learn. It honestly blew me away.

After sitting in on this class, I started to reflect on my own educational experience and how it relates to my role this summer as a fellow. My university’s motto is “To Seek to Learn is to Seek to Serve.” This little saying has really resonated with me for the last four years and I thought of it again today. I have the opportunity this summer to continue my education, learning from the staff and students at Per Scholas and through hands-on experience. Much like Per Scholas’s job training allows graduates to better serve in the Columbus IT field, the things I learn through this fellowship will allow me to better serve my community for years to come. And for that opportunity, I am so very grateful. Stick with me this summer to see how I’m able to learn and serve!

-Ashley

Hey everyone! My name is Jessie Crawford and I have the esteemed pleasure of spending my summer doing two of my absolute favorite things: working with kids and being surrounded by fabulous contemporary art. This summer, I will be working as a Columbus Foundation Summer Fellow at the Pizzuti Collection, serving as their coordinator of their summer Boys and Girls Club Tours and starting their Junior Docent program.

The Pizzuti Collection is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization presenting temporary exhibitions of contemporary art from the collection of Ron and Ann Pizzuti. The mission of the Collection is:

“…to foster cultural understanding and educational exchange by championing a diversity of voices from around the globe whose work transcends, elevates the mind and expresses freedoms. We share the belief of our founder that art is fundamental to the individual and the cultural health of a community.”

The mission of the Pizzuti Collection is an important contribution to the Columbus community, and one that I cannot wait to further as a member of their staff this summer.

A little bit more about me, I am a second year M.A. student at The Ohio State University, studying Arts Policy and Administration, which allows me to combine my love of the arts and belief that they are important in the lives of our communities with the practical application skills of nonprofit business management. It is truly a field where I feel at home, by making a difference in the world, especially local communities, and using art as that vehicle for change. I moved into the Columbus community last year from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and immediately felt at home in the city. There are exciting things happening here and I could not wait to get involved and become a part of this energy. I am so excited for this summer because I feel that I really have a chance to make a difference in the Columbus community through the work that I will be doing with the Pizzuti Collection, and the Boys and Girls Clubs of Columbus. Stay tuned for my exciting adventures this summer and hang on for what I’m hoping will be a fantastic ride!