This week, one of the favorite things I learned was about Bridgeway’s crisis stabilisation program. I was able to speak with Madison Stegall, who is the crisis stabilisation program manager. Crisis stabilisation specializes in supporting students who are experiencing a detrimental change in behaviour. Meeting with Madison, I learned that many of the students who receive care from the program significantly benefit from the program and are able to return to their daily lives with more independence. One aspect about the program that really stood out to me was that the program was proposed by Madison herself. She told me that she had initially worked at Bridgeway in a different position but was encouraged by Erin and Abby to write a program proposal for it because of her passion for serving students in crisis.
I also learned that Bridgeway is one of the very few places in the state of Ohio to have a program like crisis. This made me realise how amazing it is to have the expertise of the program’s staff at Bridgeway. However, this also means that the care is inaccessible for students who are experiencing crisis but are not students at Bridgeway and unable to receive care at the few other places.
I spoke about what I learned with Janelle and learned that many of the programs at Bridgeway were introduced by staff. Other programs such as the Bridgeway Academy Market were also introduced by staff and I thought this was amazing because it shows just how much of the organisation is the people working in it. Without the staff at Bridgeway, it would not be what it is. I feel like Madison and the crisis program would be great to highlight in the annual report.
Disclaimer: In this piece, the words female and woman refer to people with a menstrual cycle. A menstrual cycle does not determine if you are a female/woman. I feel this post can be best understood by using the words female and woman.
I am so tired is a phrase that constantly rolls through my mind. I really struggle to find the root of the tiredness. I know that your energy levels correlate with your diet, so I primarily cook for myself. For the most part, I eat my share of whole foods, including raw fruits and vegetables, plenty of healthy fats (specifically walnuts and avocados), whole grains, and a variety of protein sources (free roam, no hormone, pasture-raised chickens and chickpeas). No matter how much I improve the quality of my food or diet, I am still so tired.
If you were my doctor, you would ask what my exercise routine looks like. I get at least one hour of “activity” daily, but generally a lot more than that. I usually do 20 minutes of yoga in the morning and take a walk at some point during my workday. I have a night job at a restaurant that involves constant standing and movement on my feet, so 4 to 5 days a week, I am there for 6 hours continuously walking. On the two days that I do not work my second job, I go for a run. I would say that I get plenty of activity.
The final thing that a doctor would look at is your sleeping habits. Reflecting on my current schedule for the summer, I get up around 6 to 6:20 am, and due to my second job, I generally go to bed around midnight. Six hours of sleep is not ideal; however, it is enough to sustain myself. I do hybrid work twice a week, allowing me to get an extra hour here and there.
Looking at my daily life, you would not think I am constantly tired, but our general education system does not focus enough on explaining how hormones significantly impact alertness, mood, temperament, and general well-being. Since our current system, of course, is based on how a man functions, women are expected to be able to fit the same criteria. We are told that if a man can do it, you can do it, too, but that is not realistic.
The male hormone cycle resets every 24 hours. As seen above, men have a spike in testosterone in the morning (the spike decreases with age). The testosterone gives men energy and alertness to start their day. Throughout the day, the level of testosterone decreases, reducing energy. This cycle then resets every single day.
On the other hand, women experience a hormone cycle that is directly linked to their menstrual cycle. The cycle resets around every 28 to 35 days with the start of menstruation. If you look at the graph above, the hormones start low during menstruation, causing feelings of fatigue and tiredness. After, estrogen begins to rise, slowly increasing energy. Estrogen peaks (along with LH and FSH) during or right before ovulation and stays high for a few days. In tandem, these hormones enable high energy and confidence. Estrogen will fall as progesterone rises, but estrogen will generally have one last spike to give the body energy. Then, it will fall, giving way for progesterone to take hold. Progesterone is what will lead to any premenstrual symptoms (PMS) a woman experiences, such as mood swings, tiredness, irritability, etc. Finally, all the hormones will level out, leading to menstruation again. If that was confusing to you, you are not alone. Women who menstruate are not taught about their hormone cycles, and in general, menstruation is taboo.
Due to my constant tiredness, I searched the internet for answers other than diet, exercise, and sleep, which led me to learn about my hormone cycle. I would say that I am pretty in tune with my body, but I did not realize that practically every week, there are specific workouts and activities that I should be practicing during the different phases. It really clicked for me when I learned about cycle syncing. I had been working against myself my entire life, which caused a lot of unnecessary hardship. I fully believe this is because the world has focused on men for so long. They do not want women to thrive. Honestly, I am lucky to even be able to write that sentence. Women suffer so profoundly, thinking that there is something psychologically wrong when, most often, they do not understand how to work with their hormones. Instead of doctors educating women on their hormonal cycle, they give them birth control, which disrupts the cycle even more and even better, when they decide to come off birth control, their body goes through a detox period where it must relearn its own hormone cycle and how to produce enough of the hormones because it had been pumped with artificial hormones that did the job for it. This can cause worse mental health issues, extreme weight gain, and a major reduction in overall well-being.
It makes me so upset to know that doctors are not pushed to educate their patients on the hormone cycle, and sometimes, the doctor does not even know about it. Women have been in the shadows for so long as men built a world meant for them. Women had to pretend to fit in, causing mental and physical hardship. Now, it is up to each individual woman to learn about their hormone cycle if they want to or suffer silently because these men do not care about us. Instead, they will tell you that if you wanted to, you would, but I want to and just physically cannot. I am tired, and I must accept it. My body does not get the glory of receiving a constant spike in testosterone to get me through the day. I must instead bleed, prevent unwanted pregnancies, and PMS every single month. I then get to look forward to menopause, where my hormones start doing backflips, upsetting my entire life.
Just the joys of being a woman in a man’s world.
Thank you for reading, and please, as a woman, learn about your hormones so that you can do more than survive. If you are a man and love the women in your life, educate yourself so you can support your queen.
Hello! It is hard to believe that we are already halfway through the fellowship, but here we are. After five weeks of learning, working, and growing at the Legal Aid of Southeastern and Central Ohio, I am happy to say that this has been a great experience so far with incredibly talented people who has helped me in appreciating how a legal nonprofit like LASCO runs.
In my fifth week, things were a little disjointed due to the holiday and some of the full-time staff taking their vacations, but I was still faced with responsibilities that I had to fulfill, even though it may be through lighter supervision. However, I still kept myself working despite this and enjoyed the opportunity to work through problems myself when I did not have someone to rely on for easy answers at a moment’s notice.
For example, these past two weeks I have been working through a project that involves transforming the organization’s outreach materials into something that more accurately reflects the organization post-merger. While I waded through the documents and materials, I constantly had to work through problems on my own and get crafty with how I balance my approach, along with coordinating with staff I do not usually work with. In the end, I believe it was a great learning experience.
Looking towards the future, I expect things to return to normal; however, I look to keep applying an experimental yet focused attitude to how I approach my work. Besides these normal tasks, I am excited to get more experience in LASCO’s outreach events, possibly including a clinic that focuses on record sealing and expungement! I very much hope to attend this clinic, as it would continue the exposure that I began two weeks ago. Furthermore, I might have the opportunity to visit a court, being either the bankruptcy or eviction court—either possibility I would be excited to experience.
Week five at Seeds of Caring brought a unique set of challenges and reflections. I dreaded making this post because I worked from home all week. Originally, this was our annual break, so no one was in the office, and I found myself handling tasks remotely.
Working from home was filled with ups and downs. On one hand, I enjoyed waking up at a convenient time and still managing to get a reasonable amount of work done. However, the downside was the overwhelming quietness and the lack of immediate interaction with colleagues. Although I could email if I had questions, the absence of in-person conversations made the environment feel unnecessarily quiet.
I realized that I’m not really a person who enjoys working from home and will only do it when necessary. This week confirmed that I thrive better in a structured, office setting.
Despite these challenges, I focused on research and data entry. I spent time gathering information on potential non-profit organizations and looking into various cities for potential expansion. Additionally, I took an online test to assess my personality, which provided me with some insightful feedback.
By Thursday, after working straight through Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, I felt the need to take a break. I decided to relax and look up potential non-profit organizations, finding some promising ones that could be future partners for Seeds of Caring.
Friday, I got back to work and completed most of the tasks assigned to me. As I prepare to start the new week, I can’t wait to see everyone again. Although I’m back to the 9-5 routine, I know I’ll stay grounded and be more productive in the office environment. This experience has shown me that while I’m not fully attuned to the constant waking up for a 9-5 schedule, working fully remote is not an option for me.
I can’t believe it’s already been five weeks—time surely waits for no one. This journey at Seeds of Caring continues to teach me more about myself and the kind of work environment where I thrive best.
Hi everyone! Last week, I signed off on the blog by saying I’d take the reins for the week while my supervisor went out of town and that I wanted to focus on forging partnerships. I am thankful to report back that everything went flawlessly! We had no surprises on the food security front, so I only had to take one family to the store and make one food pantry run. Although these last few weeks passed by a little slower than my first three, we expect an influx of new arrivals toward the end of my Fellowship, which may lead to more of the infamous “chaos” weeks. This makes the partnership-building task even more critical because it will drastically boost the efficiency of food pantry runs and free up time to complete other tasks.
Luckily, Week 5 brought massive progress on this front. I secured a partnership with two local food pantries—one for weekly pick-ups and another for bi-weekly pick-ups. I also started collaborating with Ohio State University on food security and working to have thousands of dry, shelf-stable meals delivered to our office to store and give to clients when needed. These three partnerships will usher in significant change, and I am excited to see how they improve efficiency and help us get through demanding weeks more easily. More partnership-building is on the horizon, and hopefully, next week, I will have more good news to deliver!
My week at FLOW was another great few days. Because of the holiday I was able to do work from home for the last two days of the week. This was nice because I was able to be in my hometown but I am still adjusting to how to be productive while not in the office. But I had a very productive week and am making lots of progress on my project. I did a good amount of cold calling this week and it was kind of successful. I am learning how to communicate our goals in the best way based on who I am talking to . I also scheduled a tabling at a local farmers market! This will be my first tabling event alone but I am looking forward to being there and hopefully having a successful time talking to residents.
On Wednesday, I attended my first Science Board Meeting. This was a two hour meeting where the science board member, Laura, hosted a meeting with about 15 other volunteers and talked about current projects and future goals. I learned so much about the process for deciding on project plans, locations, and goals. We also analyzed past results to see what would be best to do again next spring. Now that it is fully summer, it is difficult to plant or expand gardens. Spring and fall are the best times so summer is a lot of maintenance and planning work. I was also able to meet a volunteer that is dedicating a lot of time to working with Olentangy schools to plant new trees. This has been challenging because school maintenance crews are weary of the additional costs. This is frustrating because there are many ways to avoid these costs and in the long run it will decrease a schools energy costs. But I learned a lot of information from him and I hope to work with the schools more!
Hello everyone! It’s hard to believe we are halfway through the summer fellowship! Time really does fly when you’re having fun.
Having fully settled into the swing of things at CHA, I feel incredibly fortunate to be surrounded by such inspiring individuals every day. Throughout my time working in the nonprofit sector, there is never a dull moment, and every day offers a new opportunity for learning something new. With each new opportunity, I find myself growing, attaining valuable insights, gaining hands-on experience, and learning more about myself and the nonprofit world. It’s beautiful to see how dedicated CHA is genuinely to serving children experiencing food insecurity. It has been incredible to witness firsthand the impact that Children’s Hunger Alliance has on children, families, and communities across Ohio. They are hard at work in Central Ohio and the surrounding areas, providing children with millions of meals every year.
During my summer fellowship, I’ve been diving into the world of donation requests, grants, volunteer engagement, and fundraising, and I’ve loved it. This past week, I learned more about the world of budgeting! I found budgeting to be more exciting than I expected. Budgeting, like many other things, calls for a lot of strategic planning, organization, and patience due to the numerous revisions and drafts over time. In some ways, budgeting can be nerve-wracking because it requires you to plan so long in advance, but this is worth it as budgets are more than just crunching numbers; they are tools that help organizations focus their efforts on their mission and goals.
It almost seems surreal that I’ve been here at CHA for over a month. I’ve learned so much in such a short amount of time. Knowing they will fly by, I can’t wait for the next five weeks. I’m trying to cherish every moment and make the most of this incredible opportunity! I am so grateful for this experience and can’t wait to share more about my journey in the coming weeks!
Hello Everyone! I would like to share a few highlights of my week, but there is one that I want to touch on the most, given the importance of the topic. For the past few weeks, my team and I have been discussing the idea of coordinating with our partners at homeless shelters and other organizations to organize a voting campaign. This campaign is a testament to our unwavering commitment to empowering people experiencing homelessness to exercise their democratic rights. I completed a communication guide for everyone involved at CSB to inform our staff of the initiative we are taking, and this week, I met with my team to discuss the next steps and suggestions for developing a How-To-Guide as a resource for shelter operators. The How-To-Guide will provide the shelter operators with Ohio’s voting rules and regulations, tips for outreach and gathering volunteers, why this initiative is so important, and other useful information.
Exercising your right to vote is crucial, as everyone has a voice and deserves to be a part of this democratic process. Many political decisions may directly affect those experiencing homelessness, and I am passionate about getting as many people registered as possible. For those unhoused, extra barriers make it more difficult for them to register to vote, but it is very doable and feasible, especially when there is guidance available, which is what CSB is here for.
This week, I also had the pleasure of meeting our new hire, Issrah, who is filling a brand new position in our Brand and Communications team as a Communication Coordinator. I am excited to partner with her on projects and see our efficiency increase as she adds value to our team. Issrah also has a background in politics and has already provided great insight into our voting campaign, which is great! I hope everyone had a happy 4th!
Time has flown by as I close out my fifth week with City Year Columbus, marking the halfway point of this summer fellowship. It seems just yesterday I arrived at the Columbus Foundation for our first learning session and headshots. Although time has gone by quickly, I have learned so much in my role and from the people I work with.
I joined City Year during a time of transformation where not only my specific site was going through voluntary/involuntary separations and redefining the scope of roles, but the national headquarters was also dealing with this monumental shift. As part of my marketing studies, I learned about the ever-changing needs of a business and in order to remain successful in an industry you must constantly be adapting to meet your consumer’s needs. Non-profits like City Year are not exempt from this integral component of business.
At my site before I began the fellowship I had worked with a staff member on the Development team during a fundraising event. When I began the internship she had already departed from the organization but as I continue to find and utilize the abundant resources she left behind, I realize the importance of her time here and the value she contributed. It is in my belief that no matter how brief your time working with others you can always absorb something meaningful from the experience.
This past week I worked on editing the alumni videos of two of our staff members who were leaving the organization. As I worked on their videos, I got to listen to their stories about City Year and the impact it had on them in their personal lives and professional careers. I also got to hear how they influenced their community through their service.
In addition to all these changes happening around me, I found out recently that my supervisor will be unfortunately beginning a new journey at another nonprofit on July 19th. I am grateful for all that she has taught me so far, wish her success in her future endeavors, and am looking forward to all the knowledge she will share with me in her remaining two weeks.
This week was a bit different than usual. After working over 40 hours last week, I was able to take Wednesday and Thursday off to move into my new apartment, which was much needed.
On Tuesday, I headed to Spruce Run at 8 AM with my coworker, Fiona. Spruce Run is a nature center located on the Hoover Reservoir, created by Columbus City Schools as an educational resource. This week, the Grange Insurance Audubon Center volunteered to help with their bird station. We were warmly welcomed by Heather, the center’s coordinator, and the dedicated teachers who spend their summers educating kids about nature. The bird station was in a cabin filled with taxidermy and had a bit of a funky smell but was still fascinating. It featured a screened porch perfect for birdwatching. Fiona managed the birdwatching station while I ran the migration game.
Since the kids were running late, we had time to explore the center. Located in the woods, it was a peaceful escape from the urban setting of Grange. We saw newly built wetlands and an impressive garden, featuring everything from strawberries and pumpkins to potatoes, apple trees, and a patch of towering sunflowers.
When the kids arrived, we greeted them with a tunnel of high fives and music. They were divided into groups and rotated through various activities. At the bird station, the kids were enthusiastic, even though some didn’t survive through migration in the game. I was impressed by how organized and efficient everything was at Spruce Run. It was a learning opportunity, as Grange could benefit from implementing some of their organizational skills to enhance our programming.
After returning to the center, I continued working on social media posts and the sponsorship project. The day extended until 7:30 PM for the Lights Out potluck. Lights Out is a group that advocates for preventing bird collisions with windows and rescues injured birds. The potluck was an end-of-season celebration where volunteers reviewed the data collected and discussed improvements for next season. It was inspiring to connect with so many passionate people dedicated to helping birds.
Today, I focused more on the sponsorship project, created a graphic for our newsletter, and posted the “Day in the Life” camp video (see below). I also covered the front desk because many of our volunteers were unavailable.
Welcome to the blog of The Columbus Foundation's Summer Fellowship Program. Follow our Fellows as they help out the nonprofits they are matched with, learn on the job and from each other. The projects they are assigned to are challenging and highly important to the community and each nonprofit. Check back frequently, or sign up for the RSS, as many updates will be coming. It's going to be an exciting summer!
Columbus Foundation Fellowship Programs 