Author: Katie, Spring 2022 YSEP Member Working with YSEP this past spring session has been an incredibly valuable experience that I definitely recommend! The class sessions, where we collaborated with speakers who shared meaningful stories, created a space where my group was able to not only listen and ask questions, but formulate a foundation for the following service projects. After learning about how I can use my voice for the sake of my community, I planned a project where I created an informational website using a variety of resources, in order to initiate conversations centered around the pressing issue of homelessness. I made flyers, QR codes, sent out emails, and posted on social media in order to get the message circulating in my community. This project luckily gave good results with not only increased interest in the organization but also in donations. The YSEP team did a great job at guiding these service projects as well as making the learning process as interesting as possible through being active on Google Classroom and open to conversations on Zoom meetings. Overall, the mission and execution of the YSEP program created an awesome educational environment where I feel I have learned life skills that I will take with me moving forward, both in and out of community service.
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Author: Joey, Spring 2022 YSEP Member YSEP is a great opportunity for young students to learn about housing instability in their community, and use that valuable information to create a service project dedicated to improving homelessness and housing problems for people of their community. My favorite part of YSEP was collecting donations from people in my area and giving back to a family shelter in my hometown. It felt really good to be making a positive impact on people’s lives right in my own community. Not only did YSEP allow me to take initiative within my community, but I was able to learn from many different people who work to improve housing instability. It was neat to hear from people who had so much knowledge on the topic, as well as people who have dealt with housing issues. It is really important to recognize the struggles that many people face with this issue, and YSEP allowed me to do that. I recommend YSEP to any student that is looking to make a positive change in their community as well as educate themselves on the struggles of homelessness and how they can improve it.
Author: Allison Wu Today, we wrapped up our fourth session of YSEP! Our Spring 2022 session brought together students (7th—12th grade) from Wayland, Framingham, Andover, Concord, Melrose, and Lexington. During the past nine weeks, YSEP members enjoyed learning about advocacy from the Mayor of Malden and health and homelessness from Dr. Jonathan Gabbay. Today, their service project presentations were amazing and their hard work definitely showed! Together, our students raised almost $2,000 through their toiletry, sunscreen, and book drives. Great work, Spring 2022 YSEP members! We can't wait to see how you continue advocating for causes you are passionate about!
Some quotes from our Spring 2022 Members... "My favorite part about YSEP was having the guest speakers at our meetings. I feel like it made the meetings more engaging, and the speakers also had some unique perspectives on issues surrounding homelessness that helped me learn more about the topic. The speaker I found most interesting was Dr. Jonathan Gabbay because of his experience with homelessness and all the information he offered about homelessness and health, a topic which I had not previously thought about." — Junior "Now, I understand that homelessness is much more than not having a home, it is completely up to the circumstances someone is going through. Additionally, homelessness places many mental and physical burdens upon those who are afflicted with it. In the future, I will try and support organizations like housing families as much as I can. " — Senior "A major takeaway from YSEP was that it feels really good to create your own fundraiser and watch it succeed. It also is really important for people to make a change in their community and be educated on housing instability and other housing issues." — Junior "One major takeaway I had from this program is that students can have a role in benefiting the community. Previously I had thought it would be difficult for students to put together projects, but this program walked me through the process and helped me learn how to organize a community service drive." — Junior "Now, I understand that homelessness is much more than not having a home, it is completely up to the circumstances someone is going through. Additionally, homelessness places many mental and physical burdens upon those who are afflicted with it. In the future, I will try and support organizations like housing families as much as I can." — Senior "I feel like Housing Families greatly increased my understanding of homelessness and how people become homeless. YSEP definitely changed my perception of homelessness, and it also helped me learn about aspects of homelessness that I had never thought about before. This program definitely made me want to support homeless families more, especially since a fair number are not getting adequate support from the current systems. Now that I know the steps to organizing community service projects, I feel more capable of actually following through on my desire to help out the homeless." — Junior |