The Lesson I Learned While Volunteering for Girl Talk by Erica

The Lesson I Learned While Volunteering for Girl Talk by Erica - May 2018 Scholarship Essay

In high school, I was passionately involved in a community volunteer group known as “Girl Talk.” Girl Talk is a peer to peer mentorship program in which I made many friends and countless cherished memories. There were girls in the group ranging in age from 14 to 17. I was proud and honored to be chosen as the leader of my group. I took great pride by helping young girls make the often difficult transition from middle school to high school. Strong bonds and a sisterhood was created with every young girl I met.

The main goal of our program is to provide high school girls with a unique leadership opportunity in which their positive choices and examples can have a lasting effect on younger girls. Through the engagement of both age groups, it is also our goal to have a meaningful impact on the broader community by teaching the importance of giving back. By making community service an integral part of the program we hope we can inspire the girls to make a lifelong habit out of serving their community.

Some of the activities we performed to help reach our objectives were making arts and crafts. We performed other important community services such as making lunch and sandwiches for a neighborhood of homeless people. We also wrote comforting cards and letters to the people and communities of Skamania County, Washington who were devastated by the spread of wildfires and neighborhood destruction. Our letters and cards were very well received and appreciated. It also gave all of our girls a great sense of pride.

Many of the girls in this mentorship program were struggling with intellectual disabilities making their transition to high school even more stressful. Others, due to physical disabilities, were bound to wheelchairs and physically immobile. In the beginning, this was very challenging for me since I did not have any experience working with physically and intellectually disabled teens. However, I soon found great joy and compassion in serving these teens.

In my first year in a leadership role, I met Olivia. Although confined to a wheelchair, Olivia was extremely inspiring and helped me way more than I helped her. Despite her disability, her strength, and confidence in herself was utterly magnificent. She told me stories of when she was younger and sadly believed that she would never fit in. At school, she sat alone for lunch and talked only to the teachers during recess. Though Olivia felt like an outsider, she said she always hung on to the words her mom told her...”She is equal to everyone around her and you are able to do anything anyone else can do, you will just get there differently.”

I remember the first time she spoke those words; she took my breath away and made me cry. I couldn't believe how brave she was. Although I had the honor of meeting and coaching Olivia, she actually taught me more than I could ever teach her. In my mind, I was the student and she was my teacher. For a young child growing up, shy and feeling unwanted, she was far beyond her years and helped me to learn that courage, honor, and a positive attitude can be harnessed no matter what challenges life may throw at you. This is more than I could have ever learned in any classroom.

I plan to carry Olivia’s mindset and attitude with me throughout my college years. I can do anything I focus my mind on and will cherish these moments and experiences for the rest of my life.