Columbus Foundation Fellowship Programs

This week, I’ve continued to develop a plan to compost at the House, a plan for a vegetable garden, and furthered our partnership with OSU’s College of Food, Agriculture, and Environmental Sciences.

I’ve connected the House with a Central Ohio composting company, Innovative Organics, to conduct a food waste audit in the coming weeks. Gathering data from how much food waste we collect will help us know what our composting needs are, forecast how much waste we could be diverting from landfills (which is an important statistic for grants) and provide data we can share with the House to encourage folks to be more conscious of food waste.

Additionally, I’ve begun to set up basic planning sessions to create a vegetable garden at RMHC. This week, I’ve been meeting with leadership in each department of the House (family services, volunteer services, marketing, development, facilities, and kitchen) to brainstorm what they’d like to see in the garden, and how their departments would like to be involved. The beauty of this project is that there’s room for it to be relevant to every part of the House. Community partners from OSU Franklin Extension, The Franklin Park Conservatory, and Columbus Public Health have also generously provided their technical expertise.

Lastly, this week also marked the most enjoyable, surprising, and emotional fundraising event I’ve attended this summer: The Inaugural Dean’s Charity Steer Show at The Ohio State Fair. This event started when TelOhio’s CEO and OSU’s CFAES Dean Cathann Kress decided they wanted to put on an event to raise money for the House. In this show, 4-H families from across Ohio paired up with local celebrities, teaching the celebrities how to show a steer, and about the work they do as cattle farmers. In the time leading up to the show, each of the celebrities led fundraising campaigns, drumming up support for themselves and their steer. Then, at the fair, a 4-H youth and the celebrity would show the steer together, complete with judging from the president of the Ohio Cattlemen’s Association. Following awards, a mock auction (led by professional farm auctioneers), in which all the money raised was to be donated to the house.

The show was one of the most well executed fundraising events I’ve ever attended: it brought together a few disparate community urban and suburban residents, many of whom had never attended a steer show, farmers from across Ohio, Ohio agriculture organizations, and OSU students. According to fair officials, it was also one of the most well attended steer shows they’ve hosted. Lastly, the show raised a substantial amount of money for the house: just over $134,000.

What struck me most walking away from this event is that there is a large, generous community of agricultural workers in this state, coming from the counties which RMHC serves, that may not know a lot about the House. The Team Cuisine program at RMHC is less than 2 years old, and there’s still plenty of room for it to be shaped by the state’s agricultural community.

This Friday, we are receiving a whole cow from CFAES, donated and processed by under the supervision of Lyda Garcia, Assistant Professor of Meat Science. Along with Dean Kress, Lyda has been a tremendous leader in rallying OSU’s CFAES to support the House. I’m inspired by Lyda’s passion for education and philanthropy, and excited to show her and her students the House.

One reason I wanted to participate in this fellowship was to begin adjusting myself to a regular full-time 9-5 work schedule after graduation and before I begin work professionally in Autumn. As a student, I would always schedule my classes to be early morning to afternoon because I use most of my energy for the day around the times of 10am-2pm. This is why I knew the 9-5 schedule would work best for me.

Where I prefer the 9-5 schedule, I am still adjusting to fitting the rest of my life into my workday. I have struggled with running errands after work because I work within the hours businesses operate throughout the week. If I need to call the doctor’s office, bank, landlord, etc., then I need to call during my lunch break while I am at work.

On some days, I will be busy at work starting at 9am, get off at 5pm, run errands until 7, get home to make dinner and be in bed again by 10. This does not leave me very much time to do anything I like to do outside of work because I am so exhausted by the end of the day. Since CND offered me a full-time position beginning in August, I have been working hard to get my schedule down pat so I have a smooth transition from this fellowship to full-time work.

Even though I have not figured it all out 100%, I still believe this schedule is what works best for me and my personality. I love having a busy life because it is fulfilling to me to keep it all organized. I even planned multiple camping trips for some weekends in July just so I could still have the time to unplug and have my peace.

Today marked the first day of the last week of camp. Looking back, there are many lessons that I’ve learned about myself and about life. If not for the children I met, I would not have learned these lessons. When we, as adults, take on the role of listener, it’s amazing how much wisdom and love children actually have to share. I would like to use this blog as an opportunity to share some of the stories of children I’ve grown close with and what they have taught me.

The first story I would like to share is that of a boy I met last year at camp that showed me the importance of being an advocate for those you care about. When I met G* last summer, he was aggressive and defiant; yet I could tell he was simply showing these behaviors because he didn’t feel like things were fair for him. Although his behavior proved difficult at times, I formed a positive relationship with him because I was able to treat him fairly and give him the benefit of the doubt when he needed it. This summer, G was at camp again. One day in particular really struck me. He was getting in trouble for something I wasn’t aware of and he seemed to have boiled over, eventually crying. It didn’t seem like the camp counselor who was talking to him was able to get through to him so I went to talk to him. By just sitting and listening without judgement or assumptions, he was able to open up to me. Fast forward to the end of camp where he now is always respectful of me and open with me. We have a mutual sense of trust and responsibility that we can hold each other accountable for. Because of this relationship, I am able to advocate for him with other counselors, in turn making things much fairer for him.

Another camper, R* has showed me how much people, children especially, value loyalty. R makes sure I play with her every day and doesn’t let me slack. She points out when I spend time with other children and not with her. Based on our conversations, I know her values of loyalty come from a place of uncertainty and wanting to belong. Like most people, R wants to feel loved. Because of this, I make it a point to spend some portion of my day with R every day. I’ve also made sure to try to make people in my personal life feel more loved by me. R has taught me how I react under stress: I begin to isolate and close off from others and try to recoup. However, I now know that I need to set boundaries so I can still take care of myself and show up for those who need me when they need it most.

I could go on for pages about the different stories of children, but these two stuck out to me the most. Other children have taught me so many lessons; how to never take yourself too seriously, how to respectfully ask about cultures other than my own, and when to admit you’re faults. Children have so much grace and love to give and they truly never get enough credit. Beyond their funny moments and the strange things they say, children are some of life’s best teachers. I hope that during the last week of my fellowship, I can convey the stories of camp in my project.

With the start of week 8 of my internship, things were starting to mostly fall into a normal routine. Just when I thought I was getting into the groove of my work schedule, my Tuesday morning commute surprised me with a flat tire. This lead to lots of staring at the spare I didn’t even know lived underneath the floorboards of my trunk, phone calls to my parents, and ultimately leaving my car to go to work. Luckily, when I told my boss about my car I abandoned in a random parking lot near my house she instantly texted one of our colleagues and he stepped in to help me replace my flat tire during lunch. 

When my supervisor first offered to find some colleagues in the building to help me change my tire, at first my answer was, “Oh I don’t need to bother anyone else I can figure it out on my own!” Yet, after thinking about how I would manage handling this task, I did take her up on her offer and she found someone to help me. (Thank you to Binh for the lesson in changing tires and thank you to Rachel for the ride home!) 

Dealing with a flat tire is a fairly common–and annoying–experience for many, but this moment helped me realize one facet of my own personal and professional growth this summer: learning to ask for help. I often enjoy working independently on projects and want to prove to my peers that I am capable of producing excellent results on my own. I want to seem as if I have all of the answers to tackle problems myself, but that is almost never the case. Oftentimes, this mindset leads to me feeling unable to ask others for help. This summer, I’ve grown tremendously in this area and was reminded of my growth thanks to my flat tire. 

Outside of dealing with car trouble, I’ve learned to both ask for help and accept help within my professional life, too. Many of my projects this summer can lead to a lot of independent work, but I still encounter moments where I need help–from generating a list of interviewees for the oral history to asking for advice when tutoring students in summer school. I’m so lucky my supervisor and colleagues check in with me and allow me to feel comfortable asking for help when I most need it. This has helped me feel much more productive this summer and I can truly reflect on how I am growing thanks to this fellowship. Everyone finds themselves needing help navigating challenges in their professional and personal lives, and I’m glad I’m learning to embrace this!

As I sit here greeting visitors on this warm Saturday afternoon, I can’t believe I only have one last week here at the GIAC. At the same time though, my first day here feels like such a long time ago–I feel so comfortable and valued here that it’s hard to believe I’ve only been here for eight weeks, either.

This week definitely flew by the fastest! I worked the front desk Saturday and Sunday, and aside from accidentally locking my keys in my office and setting the alarm system off during a wedding brunch, I had a great time welcoming visitors and seeing what goes on during events. I also baked cookies on the dashboard of my car during the heat wave, and they turned out surprisingly well! On Monday our monarch egg hatched into the teeniest lil caterpillar–I couldn’t find it until the end of the day! We also had a program on birds again, and although I’ve helped facilitate that program ten times or so by now, I paid extra close attention to the lesson and the other activities because I will be leading that program on my own next Friday!

Then, Tuesday and Wednesday were my days off, so Monday night I drove up to the Akron area to visit some family, then spent all day Tuesday at Cedar Point! I hadn’t been in awhile, so it was definitely worth the quick trip up and the 5 am wake-up to drive back here in time for the Learning Session on Wednesday. I really enjoyed the peaceful moments to reflect on my summer and to hear about the journeys that my peers have experienced, and Doug’s insights on ambition in our personal and professional lives will stick with me for a long time. His ambition to have no regrets and his belief that you should not make decisions before you have the opportunity to do so are valuable pieces of wisdom as I head in to my final year of college and think about what’s after graduation. Sometimes I feel like I’m not ambitious because I don’t know what I want to do after I graduate, but I have to be ambitious if I want to earn the chance to have multiple options and opportunities in front of me.

We had a habitat program I got to help lead on Thursday, and our group took the longer to finish our activities and sit spots because the kids were so excited to share their reflections and observations, which always warms my heart. I also had time Thursday and Friday to keep working on my framework for the environmental justice program we’re planning. To help me with planning, I met with a former panelist during a past environmental justice event we hosted and I also talked to a volunteer from Columbus Audubon about her insights. I had enjoyable and productive conversations with these women, and it was helpful to hear feedback and support for what I’ve been working on. It’s been hard not to feel stressed out about this work sometimes because I feel like I need to have everything planned and spelled out before I leave–I’m not used to working without an explicit deadline, and I only have one more week to work on this. However, I hope to still be involved in this project even after my time here is done, plus I will still have some access to the GIAC this semester as I will be helping out as a part-time facility attendant.

I have so much going on in my last five days here–from helping out with five programs to moving out of my apartment and attending Wednesday’s board game fundraiser night at Kingmaker’s (Y’all should come! (: It’s from 5-8 pm, and you can register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/game-for-good-grange-insurance-audubon-center-tickets-63581485936?aff=efbeventtix&fbclid=IwAR3pxW77Ve7Lh4-hIyiSHAsw_bbvCljT1fUUoyYHCKLgIybCEX9kxqnM3dc). I’m looking forward to making the most of the time I have left and creating a few last memories!

Enjoy your weekend, everyone! (:

Last weekend was the weekend I had spent all summer waiting for, it was Leadership Conference weekend.
I think that it is safe to say I had a lot of expectations in a lot of different areas going into Leadership Conference, and I can honestly say that every expectation I had was not only met, but exceeded.

Throughout the summer, the topic of leadership and empowerment has been discussed pretty intensely, but I was actually able to visualize both of these while at Leadership Conference.

A main focus of the conference is on providing individuals with an Intellectual or Developmental Disability (IDD) the skills and experiences to become leaders themselves, and empower them to become active and engaged members of their community. One of the skills in focus is public speaking, and I had the opportunity to work in one of the rooms focused on public speaking. Throughout the workshops, volunteers were only there for guidance when it came to public speaking, individuals with IDD empowered themselves through their own words and developed a “speech” telling their story, which they were to present in front of a crowd. I was just in amazement about the confidence all of these individuals had and how well they were able to move the room, seeing as public speaking is such a terrifying experience for so many. It really put into perspective how transformative Best Buddies can be, it provides an opportunity for individuals with an IDD to empower themselves and also the opportunity to lead in the direction of change.

Finally, I just met some of the most amazing people while at Leadership Conference. The personal and professional stories are truly inspirational and really put into perspective the importance of the nonprofit world and helped to solidify why I have the career goals that I do.

As I am writing this I cannot believe that I only get to spend two more weeks at Ohio Wildlife Center! I have had such a great time learning how their organization runs, working with and for wildlife and meeting coworkers that turned into great friends.

I got to do a lot of cool things this week, including going on the set of Good Day Columbus! I went with other staff from OWC to promote a partnership with the Columbus Foundation to Save our Songbirds through their crowd funding platform called Better Together. I wasn’t on TV, but it was cool to see how things are run at a news station and after it aired, the campaign reached its goal of $5,000!

This week I also got to go on a release with staff at our pre-release facility! We released two litters of young skunks into the wild and I was there to capture it all on camera. It was very cool to be a part of this release because Ohio Wildlife Center’s mission is “Dedicated to fostering awareness and appreciation of Ohio’s native wildlife through rehabilitation, education and wildlife health studies,” and watching rehabilitated skunks going to live the rest of their lives as they should in the wild was a great feeling.

I have been able to be involved in a variety of projects in different areas that come with working at a nonprofit. I have done photography, worked with donors and at events, marketing, social media initiatives, animal care and much more. I have a very valuable and well-rounded experience and I am excited to make the most of the next two weeks.

Heading into my senior year of college, I stand before a fork in the road. Based on my interests, skills, and double major in both Music and English, there are a lot of paths I can take post-graduation. I could pursue writing, or teach private lessons and play in orchestras, or search for another internship, or any number of other arts-based adventures that might lead to a steady job. It’s a very scary place to be standing, to see all of the paths in front of me and feeling like I have to choose one to walk down the rest of my life.  

Prior to this week, I wasn’t considering graduate school as an option because I was thinking that I would try to find a writing-based job, which typically only requires a bachelor’s degree (depending on the job, of course). However, in Wednesday’s Fellowship meeting, the president of The Columbus Foundation came in to talk to us. Right before he left, he spoke about motivation to succeed, and how many people avoid applying to graduate school because they don’t want to put in the work to apply or are scared to. He said that if we were considering graduate school, we should just take the darn test!  

That statement really hit home with me, and it’s given me a lot to consider. My main thought right now is that I absolutely love what I’ve been doing at the MAC. I feel so at home when I’m organizing events and working with the arts and promoting the arts in the community. I see my supervisor and the Executive Director, who are rock stars at their jobs and who both have graduate degrees related to the field. If I do some serious self-reflecting, I know that in order to pursue arts administration the way I want to, I need to just take the darn test and apply to programs.  

I don’t know for sure where this path will lead me, but I want to take a second and thank The Columbus Foundation and the McConnell Arts Center for showing me this path and giving me the slight kick in the pants that I needed to actually begin the research and application process.  

This past week I’ve been moving. This will be my 3rd move since getting to Columbus for my graduate program. It’s come with logistical stresses, sweat, sunburns, and many bruises and scrapes from handling furniture and belongings. However, my time at the Siemer Institute has taught me that it also comes with and stems from privilege. I have voluntarily moved. I was never forced out due to high rent, inhabitable conditions, or an income loss that left me reeling. I’m moving because I wanted a different space, a better neighborhood, and to live under the same roof as my partner.

But the families Siemer funds don’t have this luxury. They have children to worry about displacing, they are moving because they have to, and rarely is to a better and more stable situation. All of the little complaints about drafty windows, lack of a/c, noisy neighbors, and inattentive landlords are inconsequential, compared to the struggle of making ends meet. Moving by choice is a privilege.

When thinking about the stories of housing crises I’ve heard over the last 2 months, I even feel guilty for being stressed at all during this move. If something went wrong, I have family to support me. My roommates and I are reviewing oodles of furniture and housewares to nest our new home. In contrast, some Siemer funded families move into a different home and apartment despite having no furniture and no solid back-up plans.

So, when searching the web for funny moving puns I became genuinely upset to learn that there is an entire market out their for greeting cards, silly moving box stickers, and house-warming gifts. They all make it seem so casual and natural. You can mention moving in small talk and nearly anyone will comment with a commiserative anecdote about their own moving woes.

However, instead of insinuating that people that move voluntarily should feel guilt, I suggest that they should instead feel grateful – feel humbled. And maybe, for at least a moment, think about what it means to move. Think not only about the stress and the bruises, but also what it might mean for those less fortunate.

This week’s blog is going to serve as a collection of musings and reflections regarding the pursuit of nonprofit work as a career, if that’s alright with y’all.

Unrelated to my time at HFF, the fellows attend bi-weekly “learning sessions” where we hear from nonprofit leaders in Columbus about a variety of topics. This Wednesday, we capped off our ongoing conversation about leadership with a message from the president and CEO of The Columbus Foundation, Doug Kridler. I knew as soon as he sat down at the table that I could learn  lots from his experience and outlook on the sector.

He prompted us with an opening question: “are you ambitious?” We mumbled some yeses and nodded some heads. But he pushed further: “is there ambition in working for nonprofits?” After some silence and scattered attempts at a response, he gave us respite. The group at large immediately resonated with his analysis of an ‘outsider’ reaction to hearing that our career goals were set on the nonprofit sector. He mentioned the condescending comments and metaphorical head pats, which I, too, have experienced in my very short time in the nonprofit world. It’s discouraging, because I know firsthand the enormous impact people in these spaces can make on a community, a nation, a globe. Our ambitions are seemingly deemed ‘less than.’

Which brings us back to his question. What does ambition in the nonprofit sphere look like? Is it baked into the essence of the field? To me, societal standards of ambition tiptoe around, but never truly come out and say, that money equals excellence, and it’s no secret that professionals starting out in nonprofit jobs make a very modest salary. It’s in the name, for heaven’s sake! Perhaps people feel that because nonprofits aren’t prestigious—meaning not high paying jobs—truly ambitious people choose other career paths. Remember, ambition often equates to money-making.

I know, however, that this isn’t the case. Just like any other field, our leaders are innovative, bright, and effective at what they do. It’s difficult to conceptualize what ambition looks like outside of money.

What does ambition mean, if not for the sake of personal gain and cold, hard cash? I choose to believe that nonprofit administrators and leaders seek to ambitiously change lives for others who have even less means than themselves.  I believe they have the skills and passion for advocating for the marginalized, which is excellence regardless of what judgement may follow; I believe truly ambitious people cast aside the judgement to zealously pursue their goals.