Youth Development Event #2 Easter Party at Boys and Girls Club.

The second event I attended was an Easter party at the Boys and Girls Club. This is where I do my internship so I was happy to help out with the event. For this event there was an Easter egg hunt for the kids on site. There was also egg coloring, and food for the kids and there parents.  Although it was a small party all the kids enjoyed it. It was a chance to be with the staff, their friends, and their parents all at the same time. Whenever the kids get to do anything out of the ordinary at the club they are ecstatic no matter how big or small the event. The night kicked off with the Easter egg hunt. Each child was given a bag to gather up as many eggs as possible, each egg has some sort of candy or prize inside. The child who found the most eggs would also get a giant chocolate bunny for their efforts. After the egg hunt there was the egg coloring. Each child was given a real hardboiled egg that could dye any way they wanted, allowing each egg to have its own creative touch. After that there was an informal snack for everyone where they all could relax and be with their friends and family before the Holliday. This opportunity for the families to have some social interaction with the staff and the kids together is very important. We talked about the importance of building community and having strong positive role models to guide youth. This is just one of the many ways the boys and girls club tries to build the community. Having a strong supportive together community makes for empowered youth who can reach their full potential and beyond.

Youth Development Event #1 TED Talk

For my first event I decided to listen to the TED talks. The one that stood out to me was the one by Charlie Hoehn, mostly because he reminded me of the comedian Anthony Jeselnik. Lol. In all seriousness his talk did have a lot of meaning, and it was about an issue that I may soon face. He spoke about once you graduate there is no guarantee that you will land a well paying job, or any job for that matter. He suggested doing free work, which is not the same as an internship. He explained that free work was less formal than an internship, and you get to work on projects that you want to work on. It is a great way to do what it is you are good at, and do what you are passionate about. He explained that getting stuck at a job that you don’t enjoy and isn't really what you want to be doing is not what you want to happen. The beauty of free work is that you know it is something you would do even if you weren’t getting paid……… because your not. But this wont always be the case, by doing free work on stuff you are passionate about and learning about things you want to learn about you are building skills for a job you will want some day. After enough time you will impress the right person and you will land a job that you truly want to do, and a job you know, and they know you are good at. This relates to the Youth Development philosophy because passion is a big part of youth development. I think everyone who joins YDEV has a fair amount of passion for this particular area. Everyone enjoys doing youth development, and has the skills for youth development. We all joined the program to expand our skills in youth development, and yes there may be a fair amount of free work involved in our field. But it doesn’t matter because we are building towards our future, one we chose, and one that we can be proud of when its all over.