Weekly Words from our Director: 10/27

Happy Halloween week! Here's a message from our awesome director, Dean. 

Good Morning!

Artist, actress, and all-around funny woman Lily Tomlin once quipped, "I always wondered why somebody didn't do something about that.  Then I realized I was somebody.” 

This semester, I have been blown away by the amazing students at the University of Utah who seem to instinctively know that they are indeed the "somebody" needed to do "something."  The Bennion Center continues to attract and educate a tremendous cadre of young people who are improving our communities, leading change, inspiring others, and making a big difference in people’s lives.
    

Last Tuesday, I got to participate in the Service House Dialogue where students Gina Ha, Oliver Anderson, and Taylor Stratford, facilitated a stimulating discussion on the role of art and artists in civic engagement.     They adeptly provided a well-researched introduction about how art has, is, and will continue to generate important social commentary and civic action.  The ensuing conversations touched on themes of art as a social connector,  the speed and breadth of art dissemination through new technologies, and the ways in which art mobilizes individuals to create social change and help people in need.

On Wednesday, student leaders Emily Garfield and Kyleigh Kinzie stepped up with poise and professionalism to rally support and enthusiasm for our Project Youth among the Salt Lake School District principals.  Next spring semester, these two dynamic student leaders will welcome more than 1,000 sixth graders from area Title I schools to the University of Utah to experience a small taste of college life at the .  Emily and Kyleigh will coordinate hundreds of college student volunteers to serve as "mentors for a day" and share their educational journeys while they lead campus tours and activities.  These young ladies have their work cut out for them, but after I witnessed them in action at the School District Building, I know the project is in good, capable hands.   They’ve already had an overwhelming response from principals!

On Friday and Saturday, the Bennion Center’s amazing Student Board hosted a Fall Retreat for interested volunteers which included fun team building, food, dancing, and an important garden service project.  I had fun getting to know more students in a townhall question and answer session.  The students prepared thoughtful and interesting questions that triggered winning conversations.  I look forward to working with these students to dream, design,and implement a great future for the Bennion Center.   

Each student, in her or his own way, embodies the Bennion Center mission to foster lifelong service and civic participation by engaging the University of Utah with the community in action, change, and learning.  And, each appears to have had the same epiphany as Lily Tomlin... that they are the "somebodies" here to make a difference.  

Have a terrific week!

Warm Regards,
Dean

Student Leader Positions Available!

Are interested in getting more involved with the Bennion Center? Do you need some leadership experience? 

Bennion Center Student Board, 2014-15

We still have several student leader positions open for this 2014-2015 school year! The Bennion Center would be nothing without service-minded, engaged students like you driving our mission forward. One of the things that sets the BC apart from other community service centers on campuses across the nation is the fact that we are a student-run organization. We are extremely lucky to have the talented, diverse, supportive staff as our scaffolding in the BC, but the bulk of leadership is through students. So, if you want a bit more of your college experience, apply for one of these positions today!

Listed below are the positions we still are looking to fill and a brief description of what the position entails. Feel free to hop over to our website, www.bennioncenter.org for more information, or reach out to us on Facebook, Twitter, or comment hear, and we'll get you the information you need! 

Education and Advocacy:

Bud Bailey Apartment Community Tutoring (Program Director position) 

• Recruit students to participate in this program
• Act as the leader to assist in organizing tutoring activities
• Attend weekly tutoring sessions
• Assist in evaluating the efficacy of the program and track participation
• Coordinate with Services Coordinator to ensure appropriate and successful engagement with participant

SOARE  (Program Director position)

• Meet with Mountain View teachers to assess needs and plan
• Use or make contacts on campus willing to host field trips
• Coordinate hosts and Mountain View
• Report success to Bennion Center
• Manage volunteers
• Act as chaperone on field trips

Health and Ability: 

Meals on Wheels (Program Director position)

• Coordinate and schedule volunteers to deliver meals.
• Ensure that meals are delivered in a timely manner.
• Plan for back-up volunteers in the event that a volunteer cannot make it to his/her assigned day.
• Meals will be delivered to the Bennion Center by 10:00am Monday-Friday. Volunteers have until 2:00pm to deliver 8-10 meals to homes located near the University of Utah Campus. The Student Program Director is expected to serve as a volunteer within the program.

VA Nursing Home (Program Director position)

• Volunteer at least once a week for two hours.
• Schedule volunteers to fill time slots (at least 2 hours/day).
• Recruit/maintain an email list of all volunteering UofU (BC) students.
• Plan at least one volunteer project for the Activities Department.
• Act in a professional and respectful manner.

Brittany Thurgood Spotlight

BENNION CENTER 2013-2014 SPOTLIGHT

Brittany Thurgood: Arts For Youth

                                                          

What is the best advice you have ever received?

Do something you love and you won’t have to go to work. 

If your life had a theme song, what would it be?

A country song.

Do you have a recurring dream? If so what is it?

I don't have any recurring dreams. However, I still remember a recurring nightmare I had when I was a child. I was in a grocery store hiding in an ice freezer from a monster. I had this same nightmare because I was always alone in the freezer and I would wake up just as the shadow of the monster is about to open the freezer door.

What is your  biggest pet peeve?

People who are rude to others and themselves. I really can't stand being around that type of negativity

What are the 5 things you cannot live without?

Family, Friends, God, Food, and Books.

What has been the happiest moment of your life so far?

Seeing people I haven't seen in a long time. 1. When I moved to Utah and was able to spend holidays with my family. 2. Visiting my old friends in different states

Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

Still in school. Hopefully in medical school.

College Bound Highland

College Day

A Day Of Inspiration, Information And Incentive

Highland High School became a community partner with the Bennion Center on Fall 2011. The program started because of two moms at Highland High who identified the need of free ACT prep classes at the school and came to the Bennion Center for help. I was excited to direct the program and get it up and running as soon as possible. As a result of the 2011-2012 evaluation on the ACT Prep course, I felt that the kids at the Highland High needed more than just preparation for an assessment test; they needed reasons and encouragement to want to take the test and go to college.

In order to improve the program and be able to reach out for more kids, it was proposed that the program adapted a larger approach – the program would then be called College Bound. In addition to the ACT prep classes, the program would offer tutoring and other tools for students to be successful in high school. A bigger and exciting addition to this program would be an event called “College Day”.

The purpose of College Day is to inform high school students about college preparation, inspire them to pursue higher education and let them know that they have incentive and support.  The idea was to bring Highland High students of all years (freshman, sophomore, junior and senior) to spend a day at the University of Utah to learn about the importance of going to college, what they can do in high school right now to prepare for it and get a feel of what college looks like.

With the help of amazing volunteers and a dedicated co-director, we had an incredible event. Initially, we were planning College Day for 40 students but we had so many more interested in coming that we ended up having 110 students being part of this. All the kids that came to the U were excited to learn more about college and were very receptive. This is a part of our community partners’ reflection about the event:

“Highland High absolutely loves The Bennion Center. College Day was a great success. We cannot believe the thoughtful hours of hard work you so generously gave our students.  Breaking the students into their classes was a wonderful idea. Sometimes, college seems overwhelming but the students were taught the steps they need to take now to make higher education attainable”

We’re happy to announce that College Day will be back for Spring 2013 on March 28 and we need a lot of volunteers to make it happen!

For more information about College Day and how to get involved, please email us at actprephighland@gmail.com

- Tammy Reque, College Bound Program Director

Arts for Youth

What is Arts For Youth?
Arts For Youth works with Title I schools in the South Salt Lake City district to teach art lessons to kids. Arts For Youth (AFY) works at two different elementary schools: Lincoln Elementary and Woodrow Wilson Elementary. Volunteers go to the after-school programs and teach kids art in the form of visual, musical, theatrical, dance, or more. Along with teaching art, volunteers are role models for the students (grade 1-6) by encouraging them to respect each other and the environment.

Volunteer Roles:

• Lesson Planner: This person comes up with the main lesson plan (which should be about an hour long). There are many sources to find lesson plans: YouTube, Pinterest, or simply thinking back to when you were doing art as a kid.
• Instructor: This person gets the attention of the students and explains the lesson plan to the students. It is more organized to have one instructor; however, all the volunteers walk around and help the students.
• Material Pick-up:   This person picks up the materials bag from the Bennion Center on the day of volunteering.
• Photographer: This person takes uses their own camera to take pictures of the volunteers, the students, and the art process.
• Shadow: All new volunteers are required to attend a shadowing session, where they will go to a school and follow a previous AFY volunteer. They will see what the different roles entail and they will get the chance to work with the kids before they are required to complete a background check.
• Driver (optional): A lot of our volunteers do not have cars, therefore we have the optional driver for anyone who has a car and would like to give rides to other volunteers. If not, we highly encourage our volunteers to take public transportation to the schools (its FREE with a UID). 

 

Why Should You Volunteer with Arts For Youth?

All of our volunteers have a great time working with the kids at the elementary schools. Similarly, the kids LOVE having college students come to their school to help them with art. The kids are so enthusiastic and look forward each week to see University of Utah volunteers. Also, every year, there is an Arts For Youth Showcase for the kids to show off their beautiful artwork. This showcase is a chance for students and their families to come to a free event and see the artwork, get free food, and have a great time with their child. We always have our volunteers at the Showcase for face painting or helping out with other small art projects. So, if you are looking for a leadership role or just want to volunteer with fun kids, then Arts For Youth is the program for you!

-Brittany Thurgood, Arts for Youth Program Director 

Soaring Eagles

Soaring Eagles is a volunteer program at Mountain View Elementary a title 1 school located on the west side of Salt Lake City.  I am the program director (PD) for this program. The Bennion center has a partnership with Mountain View and also works with a few other programs at this school. The purpose of this program is to help students stay on task, learn, and have a mentor outside of the traditional methods (other than a teacher) it gives them support through someone who is connected with the university on a more direct level. The student-volunteer relationship establishes a network for the student to feel more comfortable and be excited to learn and think about attending college, using resources, and being a support system for the students. 

Volunteers work with kids in k-5^th grade and have the chance to be able to be able to do different kinds of volunteering which include In-Class Support, Supervision, Clerical, Homework Help, and Recess/Lunch Supervision. Volunteering at Mountain View provides many benefits to the community and personal growth. In my personal experience I have been able to connect with people I would not normally get to know if I was just going to school without my extra volunteer work. It is beneficial to the community by providing a service that is so important to the development of a child’s life. Being able to show a child that you want them to succeed in their schooling and afforded the educational opportunities that they should be able to take advantage of is an irreplaceable service. Current volunteers in my program have told me that they really enjoy working with these kids and they are going to continue their service for the second semester. It is also beneficial to be able to understand and work with a diverse group of people, and be able to relate to children and adults, as well as other college students who are interested in the same things as you are.

Sometimes it’s not easy feeling like you have made an impact on a child’s life , some days are better than others but it’s definitely worth it to be able to have one good impact instead of none at all. To be able to create the sort of bond and support in a child’s life is really important to their development and growth. Students volunteer at least 1 hour a week (sometimes more) for a least a semester (or from the time they start to the end of the semester) any time between 8am-6pm Mon-Fri.

Mountain View Elementary is a very diverse school that makes it unique, in addition to the soaring eagles program there is also a school garden where families of the kids that attend the school can learn how to grow their own food and prepare it, this is also a very important skill for children (and anyone) to learn to enhance their lives.

Being able to work so closely with children and community partners has really helped me to be able to understand people that come from all walks of life. As the year has progressed I have been able to learn so much from students at Mountain View, the bennion center, and staff and community partners. University students are welcome to bring their own creativity to the classroom or to provide feedback to teachers so that if there is a problem changes can be made and volunteers, teachers, and students can all feel like they are in a safe space.

I would highly recommend this program if you like working with kids, are interested in education and diversity, or are just looking for something different to try. 

- Kylie Farris, Soaring Eagles Program Director