How do you write about an act of service when it’s a one-time act? It’s a little uncomfortable to call yourself a volunteer when it isn’t something you do regularly, yet, dipping your toes in and serving for a day or a few hours is still more than nothing…right?
First, some personal context if I may. Before our time with George Washington University here in DC, I understood that MLK Day was to celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. King, however, his teachings around service were not part of my public education. When I asked several people if they knew that the purpose of MLK day other than what I had mentioned, they were also unaware that it was intended to be a national day of service. With this as our jumping-off place, let us begin!
The course of the day looked something like this: we were checked in and received name tags with our site assignment, t-shirts, and were asked if we are registered to vote. Eventually, we meandered our way to Lisner Auditorium where volunteers were to have the day contextualized by several speakers including staff of the Honey W. Nashman Center for Civic Engagement & Public Service (with support from the Multicultural Services Center and the Office for Diversity, Equity, and Community Engagement), the University President, a representative of the Peace Corps, and an alumni who provided the keynote speech.
If you would like to see some of what we saw during the orientation, please see the video below! (Provided by the Corporation of National and Community Service)
Reflecting on the speakers we heard prior to the keynote, I had learned that GWU actively produces a large number of Peace Corps volunteers and that the school’s population is civically engaged. An aim of the orientation was to make the volunteers feel unified in MLK’s vision and that MLK day is a day on, not a day off.
The keynote speaker was a recent graduate, Zinhle Essamuah, class of 2017 who introduced herself with her pronouns and asked for a moment of silence to acknowledge the indigenous land that we were currently residing on. Why do I point this out? Frankly, it was one of the first times I have seen it and it was impactful. Miss Essamuah is currently a Host and Correspondent for NowThis, an online media news company. Some highlights I took from her speech were of issues she took with GWU. For example, the imperialist and racists foundations and how they are still reflected in their mascot: the colonials. Second, working in the news brings about constant pain around current events. She urged that pain in our current political climate should not be ignored as those who came before us had endured pain to get us to this point. She was transparent, direct, an excellent storyteller, and authentic. We left the auditorium feeling prepared to participate as MLK had preached.
We had some bus troubles getting to our assigned place of service, the Mazique Parent Child Center, “a head start program in DC which provides services for low-income children and families as well as private pay families.” We had the opportunity to meet their incredible administrative team, teachers, and staff who told us a bit about the history of the program which was one of the first early headstart programs in the US. Here is an excerpt from their website:
“When Mazique was founded, it was the first and only Parent Child Center in the District of Columbia that provided home-based services to pregnant women and children from birth to age three. Mazique was the first infant center in DC and among the first to serve children with special needs. We continue to be the pioneer Head Start program in the country with a medical clinic as a result of a 20-year partnership with Howard University Hospital Pediatric Residency Program. Mazique is a child development center that assists parents in developing skills, obtaining knowledge and becoming responsible advocates in ways that empower them to successfully promote their children’s growth and development, while simultaneously receiving valuable tools that promote and lead families to complete self-sufficiency.”
As for our service, we were assigned to locations in the facility where some of us organized, cleaned classrooms, and sanitized toys. What we did in the grand scheme of things seemed small in relation to the mission of the organization. The time we had was short and felt incomplete and many of us wished we could have stayed all day. The teacher I was working with asked once I had finished cleaning if we could make paper flowers for the windows since the kids don’t get to see flowers in the city. Here is the origami tutorial I used in case they would like to make more!
At first, our participation in GWU’s Day of Service didn’t seem to align with the objectives of the class but I think we gained a lot from the experience. Arts access and education have been a constant theme over the course of our site visits and through some research, I found that Mazique partners with Arts Has It which is a STEAM educational program. Mazique also has a number of other partners that range in size and provide a variety of services. As young adults who are looking at entering the workforce with a liberal arts degree, it is easy to neglect the privilege that many of us have had when it comes to the early childcare we may have received. To share a bit of personal information that has been lying dormant in my mind until last Monday was that my parents depended on a nearby headstart while I was growing up. They were teens when I was born and the experience of being back in a headstart facility felt almost like a pilgrimage to my past, trying to do a little bit of something that shaped who I am today in ways that I may not be fully aware of. As for career paths, I hadn’t considered working with small children (as they make me nervous) but my hope is that our levels of awareness will now help us in being stewards to children and families.
