Move 3,000 miles away in a week? Sure!

Imagine a man with salt and pepper hair that resembles a mullet, with a body in peak physical condition, and always wearing a bright purple item of clothing. This man held you responsible for your actions, accepted nothing but the best from you, and if you weren’t paying attention, would jump on top of your desk. His mantra was to always have a “positive mental attitude” and even after cancer attacked his body, the only change you saw was him ramming into your desk with a scooter instead of jumping on top of it. Mr. P was my 7th grade social studies teacher and he rocked. Everyone wanted to be in his class. I considered myself lucky when I found out he was my teacher because that made me the 4th member in my extended family to have him. It also meant I had 4 different names. They all had told me to watch out, he was crazy, but a good kind of crazy. And after being in his crazy classroom, the only thing I wanted to be was a teacher.

I began working with kids in high school, coaching at first, then working at a summer day camp, and then running a site at an after-school program, all of the time thinking that it was great practice for me for when I became a teacher. I spent 5 years of college and 17 very long weeks student teaching in order to graduate and earn my certification in secondary education with a concentration in social studies. However, the summer after I graduated, I decided to try something different, and applied to an AmeriCorps position as the Education Coordinator for a Boys & Girls Club in Olympia, WA. To my surprise, and to the surprise of my family and friends, I was on a plane to Olympia three weeks later.

I missed home at first, insisted that this was only one year of service and when I got back in July, I would be searching for a teaching job. But I didn’t go back in July, at least not permanently. The year had changed me, the kids had changed me, and the people I had the opportunity to work with inspired me. The Boys & Girls Clubs of Thurston County opened my eyes to the impact I could make outside of a classroom. I didn’t have an earth-shattering number of kids in the program I had created, but I had a few that I was truly able to help. The thanks and genuine appreciation for simply being there became an addicting feeling, and when I was offered the job of Director of Membership Services for the county, I couldn’t say no.

My year as an employee of the Clubs was even better than as an AmeriCorps. I was able to be the one to tell parents we had approved their scholarship, that they had been picked for Adopt-A-Family this year for Christmas, or that we had four new bikes donated and we wanted to know if they could use one. The whole experience was great, but it was very far from my family. I wanted to be home, in the communities I had grown up, able to make a difference in some way. By this time, I had figured out that Mr. P hadn’t inspired a love of teaching in me, but instead a deep desire to positively impact the lives of youth. So I got back on the AmeriCorps website, and started looking for positions that coincided with my goals. I came across an agency that wanted to help kids improve their reading skills, but they had already filled the position. My resume was passed on to the United Way of Greater New Haven, and rest is history!

As cheesy as it sounds, I think of Mr. P a lot. I even got a tattoo with the initials “P.M.A.” as a memorial to him. He passed away when I was in high school, but no one will ever forget him. I’m so excited to be working with the Boost! Initiative and United Way, and my goal this year as part of the United Way and member of AmeriCorps VISTA, is to have that life-changing, positive impact on a kid that Mr. P had on me.