Service - 135 hours 50 minutes
Lake Forest Arts and Crafts - 34 hours 30 minutes
Description: Every Friday after school the member of Key Club and I would go to a local elementary school and teach the EDEP Program kids a new art&craft. The activity counts as both creative and service, this portion has been counted towards the service category.
Reflection:Lake Forest Arts and Crafts is a
service/creative activity run by a fellow IB classmate and myself. We do this
through a service club at our school, Key Club. The activity goes to the elementary
school every Friday to the EDEP Program and helps teach the children there a
different art or craft every week. We both have been attending this activity
since we were freshmen and took over as the chairmen our sophomore year, so
this will be our second year running this activity. The basic responsibilities
are to plan a craft for every Friday, keep track of attendance of the member’s
community service hours completed through this activity, communicate with both
the members and the EDEP coordinator in case there needs to be a cancellation
of the activity, and to be a leader during the activity enforcing the rules and
dissolving issues.
My partner and I decided to wait
until the second month of school to start the activity to allow everyone to settle
into the new school year. During the first month I contacted the new EDEP
coordinator for the elementary school, Bryan, and explained our program to him
since he was mostly unfamiliar besides what the previous coordinator had told
him. Afterwards we set up a starting date for the activity, September 5th. The activity continued seamlessly through the rest of the 2014-2015 year. That is until we encountered a problem at the very end of the year.
That being said, we do refuse to let
this activity parish because it is a popular activity Key Club offers that many
of the students enjoy attending. My cochairmen and I will simply be looking for
a new elementary school in the area to go to every Friday for the next year. We
will discuss this with our regular attendees and see if they have any
suggestions. Exams and summer is right around the corner, though, so we may
have to put off finding a new school till the next year when we’ll have more
time to contact, meet, and negotiate terms with a new EDEP Program.
With the end of the
year came fewer members due to studying for final exams or wanting a break for
summer, but our regular group stayed faithful so everything went fine for our
last activity day. Except when we arrived the EDEP coordinator, Bryan, took my cochairmen
and I to the side and explained that we were not welcome back next year. He
explained that he had tried to email us earlier in the week to explain, but
forgot. With the new Wii gaming system that the program had received along with
the dwindling number of afterschool kids and surplus in staff he felt that he
did not need volunteers to help with the kids any longer. There was also the
problem of some of the other afterschool volunteering programs being
inconsistent with their activities and not showing up for a while and then
suddenly appearing again. Although our activity was appreciated, there wasn’t a
need for it anymore. I did not argue with him that we had formed a bond with
the kids in the three years that we had been doing the activity and many of
them looked forward to seeing us every Friday. It was his decision to make and
we accepted it.
Alachua County Humane Society - 35 hour 10 minutes
Description: I am a foster home for kittens for the Alachua County Humane Society which means when ever they have kittens who are young enough to be bottle-fed or are sick my family takes them in to raise them until they are either of the adoptable age or have recovered from their illness.
Reflection: Fostering for the Humane Society is probably my second most proud achievement in my CAS project. I have always had a great love for animals so this was a perfect outlet for me to better my community while indulging in a personal interest. Gainesville has been working towards becoming a no-kill zone in the past few years, meaning that all stray and homeless animals are able to live safely at a shelter without fear of being euthanized before finding a forever-home. Foster homes are a large part of this movement because they give a shelter or rescue center the ability to take on more animals without having to worry about running out of space because all of the animals are properly taken care of. I foster kittens in particular because my mother has extensive knowledge of veterinary care for kittens and we cannot foster dogs due to one of my older dogs being aggressive to other, foreign dogs since he has become blind. It also helps that my younger dog, only around two years old, has a keen sense of motherhood in her. So much so she even will bring us baby squirrels and birds who have fallen from their nests to save. She loves to help raising the kittens - especially if that means she gets to lick the kittens faces' clean after mealtime. My main goal for fostering was simple. One - raise each litter in a healthy environment of cleanliness and social interaction so the kittens do not get sick nor to they develop antisocial or aggressive personalities that will make them less likely to be adopted.
Since every kitten had a different personality just like humans do it was a challenge to figure out how I had to approach each litter in order to teach them how to drink from a bottle, then eat from a syringe, then from a spoon, eventually a bowl, and finally to have free range to eat when they feel hungry without my supervision. The hardest transition phase is definitely from syringe to the spoon/bowl status because I have to gradually ween them off of trying to get their food by sucking on a syringe tip to biting and licking the food off of a spoon. It's not like I can directly communicate with the kittens and sometimes they would refuse to transition from bottle to syringe or syringe to bowl for and I would have to work with their stubborn nature. Generally kittens eventually transition naturally because in the early stages they grow exponentially fast and therefore require a great amount of calories to burn. So once they figure out the milk supplement isn't properly filling their stomachs they start in on the kitten wet food and later kitten chow as their dietary needs change. It's just that sometimes this needs a little bit of encouragement on my part. Another part of their diet is determining how often they should be fed at every stage in their kitten-hood. A few days to a few week old kittens often need to be fed every two-three hours continually even into the night. Since I obviously could not risk my academic career I had to collaborate different feeding periods in which I took over and others when a family member fed the kittens instead. As the kittens grow they tend to eat more in one sitting until they reach a few months old then they start eat fewer times and a constant amount at certain times of the day.
Due to feeding time often being messy and painstakingly failed attempts at transitioning the kittens over from the milk supplement, warm and wet towel baths are common in the early stages of life. You must also be extremely thorough in drying the kittens before putting them back in their designated area again because the water could cause them to catch a cold (this can cause a reaction as extreme as death in the early stages of kitten-hood). The kittens must also be placed in an area where there is a constant heated area to sleep so they don't get too cold and then to have a separate non-heated area for when play starts to develop and also to put the litter box for potty training the kittens. Miraculously enough, almost every litter I have fostered thus far, which is around ten, has learned to use the litter box of their own accord with no interference on my part. It seems to just be a developmental trigger that as soon as they hit a certain age they just know that using the litter box for their business is the correct way to go.
On a totally different note I feel like fostering the kittens has made me grow more mature as a person because I'm not constantly trying to adopt every kitten I foster and understand the reality of not being able to own every animal I lay eyes on. I have also gained valuable knowledge from my mother about proper kitten care and how to deal with sickness and injuries should they occur. I've now helped nurse back to full health a litter of three kittens who contracted an unknown illness that was attacking their immune systems and causing them respiratory distress so it was often hard for them to breathe, eat, or even drink. It took a month to get the three kittens back up to full health and now all three of them are living together with a family of a young couple and their two children. It is these types of success stories where I know I helped provide the opportunity for a cat to find a proper home and to help a wanting family find the perfect pet that I continue fostering and diligently raising my foster kittens with a careful hand.
Dudley Farm Historic State Park - 7 hours
Description: On Cane Grinding Days, the biggest event of the year for the state park where all activities are fully functioning in order to raise awareness about the past and educate the public about the Dudley history I act as a historical guide and clothes washing demonstrator to the public. This activity counts as both active and service hours, but has only been counted towards service.
Reflection: I have been volunteering at Dudley Farm since before I could technically record the hours. It has always been an important part of my life and I know the farm and it's history like the back of my hand. Some years ago when Governor Rick Scott first came into office he attempted to shut down Dudley Farm along with many other crucial state parks around Florida. In response to this I actually became a young activist who spoke out against him and even created a website about Dudley Farm and why it is so important to keep it funded, running, and open for the public to enjoy. It's a place with deep roots and I never leave there without learning something new, which was exactly my goal when I aimed to volunteer my first Saturday of December there in my junior year. I wanted to talk to the visitors and see what I could learn from them that I hadn't known before. While there isn't always much I can learn from the toddlers running around with their parents who came to the farm for some cute photos and also to help their kids learn history in a fun way, there is an equal amount of people from older generations who come and are more than willing to share their story with me as we discuss the history of the time.
The Dudley's lived a fairly productive and prosperous lifestyle in comparison to the average family during the 1800s and on in to the 1900s. They were one of the frequent stops cattle herders and other travelers made because they ran a general store and post office all from their farm. The family itself was large, which swayed towards the beneficial side due to a large amount of work needing to be done around. For example, two of the girls were in charge of maintaining a chicken and egg business all on their own that had amassed at its peak over 300 chickens. A lady I talked to on the day I volunteered taught me about how her own family members knew the Dudley's and how efficient the farm was run. While she watched me teach children how to use the ringer to squeeze excess water out of the clothes she further taught me later about the progression of washing machines through her life and how she started out in her childhood with a washboard and how in just her lifetime she has an automatic washer that all she has to do is press a few buttons and it does all the work for her. It was interesting to fathom the layering of history and experiences this woman had and while I never caught her name, I will always remember her thoughtful and reminiscent comments about the past and present.
Tree Quilter's Guild Quilt Fest - 3 hours
Description: Held on May 2, 2015, the Tree Quilter's Guild of Gainesville that my mother is apart of hosted a festivity where they displayed the quilts they had made in that year. This activity only counts towards service hours.
Reflection: I served two jobs while at this event. My first task was to man the refreshments room for the other volunteers at the event. I first set it up with all the food and designated where the cooler filled with drinks was and then made sure everything stayed full and all of the volunteers in the different rooms got food should they want it. I would take orders and then bring their food to them if necessary. I enjoyed the work because nobody is anything but cheerful to the person bringing them their lunch and it was also a way to stretch my legs and see the entire Guild event outside of my small room filled with food. I would purposely take the long way around just so I could catch glimpses of all the quilts, the silent auction, and the other tables filled with handmade products for sale. After lunch hour was over and most everyone had eaten their fill I was switched over to white-glove duty. This is where I literally wear specially made cotton white gloves to touch and lift the quilts on display for people who want to see the back since handling it with your bare hands can often damage the fabric to some pieces - especially if too many people keep rubbing their hands all over the quilt pieces. During this job I was able to walk around the event freely and was even able to snap some pictures of my favorite quilts during moments when I wasn't being called over to handle a quilt for a viewer. Every quilt was made differently and had a distinctly different style so there was no lack of inspiration to be found. While I first learned to quilt when I was five, I have not done much as of late do to time constraints and lack of ideas, but this festivity has convinced me to take up this hobby once again upon entering college.
Collaborative Club and Community Mural - 3 hours
Description: After the November Attacks on France, Lebanon, Kenya, Nigeria, and many other countries that suffered due to terrorism the French, Muslim Awareness, and National Art Honors Society clubs of EHS created a community event to paint a mural in tribute to those who fell victim in these events. This activity is both creative and service, but has been counted towards the service category since it was done through the service club of NAHS.
Reflection: As an artist who is just beginning to love using spray paint and is very passionate about what the mural would stand for, this project made me feel ecstatic. Although it was initially postponed due to rainy weather, I cleared my schedule and made a point to attend anyways. I arrived on the scene just in time, camera in hand, to document the event as well as help create part of the mural that expressed feelings I held close. This mural was about community and support. It was about love, not hate, and connoted a feeling of togetherness that the world is currently in need of.
