Teens With Helping Hands by Jasmine

Teens With Helping Hands by Jasmine - February 2020 Scholarship Essay

During my time at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, I noticed a large number of children hospitalized for extended stays, all due to some incurable or slow-to-heal disease. It broke my heart to see so many childhoods taken away, those children who never had the chance to experience everything the average kid experienced. State fairs, carnivals, late-night movies, school field trips, sleepovers, none of it. I wondered if there was some way I could help return their childhood to them.

A huge aspect of normal childhood is education, whether it be public school, private school, or homeschooling. I realized that kids who had to spend long periods in hospitals didn’t get to experience all the joys that come with learning, especially at such a critical point in their lives to develop and discover who they were. Without a steady education system, it’s as if people had already given up on returning the children to their normal lives. A fledgling idea started to form in my mind to start an organization that combines volunteering for high schoolers and a way to tutor kids in hospitals.

High schoolers are told time and time again that colleges love to see community service and volunteering on resumes and in essays. So naturally, organizations such as NHS, Key Club, and many others are founded to help high schoolers obtain those hours more easily and in an organized fashion. By partnering with these organizations, high schoolers can get tutoring experience as well as provide hospitalized children a window to the outside world. I know firsthand that extending a hand to children who are disadvantaged in some way can mean the world to them.

As a youth leader for a volunteer tutoring program, I know what it’s like to deal with the ups and downs of both managing other volunteers as well as interacting with kids that have different backgrounds than me. The contrast in experiences proves to be a difficult hurdle to overcome, but it’s worth it to see kids that used to fail tests now ace their classes. The kids that I work with are unique compared to many other first-generation immigrants in that they’re refugees from Myanmar, forced from their homes before making their way to the US. English isn’t their first language, so school is difficult for the majority of them to adapt to.

Helping the refugee kids overcome their language barrier between them and success is not an easy task, but through hard work and a sense of unity between the volunteers, we’re able to get it done. I believe the same mentality can be applied to giving some normalcy back to kids in hospitals. The curriculum can be obtained from nearby school systems, worksheets and activities printed from online (with copyright permission!), and best of all, personal relationships established between the tutor and the child.

This idea is very limited in scope at the moment, and the details are a bit hazy, but I believe with enough love and attention this plan can become a reality. This can help so many kids lead happier and fuller lives, even if life may not have given them the best circumstances. I’m fortunate in that I’m not battling a chronic disease or that I’m not a refugee, but my privilege should not be spent on the sidelines, only caring about my own life. The resources and knowledge that I’ve been blessed with can and should be used to help those without and the mission that I had in mind is one way I can give back to a society that just needs more kindness all around.