Reliving the transformation of GYSD

Dan Maurath is a corps member serving on the Bank of America Team at A.J. Dorsa Elementary School.

At the end of service days past, I found myself visually amnesiac. I could not remember how the school campus or park had once looked. The site had been so transformed that my memory was also transformed. The faded faint lines faded in my memory, replaced by the bright colorful paint of the blacktop and murals.

Transform was our theme for Global Youth Service Day 2011. So on April 16 at Majestic Way Elementary, I sought to capture the transformation of the day. I made a visual record of the transformation. I recorded the initial outlook of the school and the progression of it into the vibrant campus it’s become. I made two separate time-lapses, one of which is included below, and a short documentary entitled GYSD 11.

The time-lapses were shot at 10-minute intervals throughout the lifespan of the projects. I sourced much of the documentary from volunteers and other corps members who became amateur filmmakers for the day, documenting the progress of their projects and the transformation through their eyes. All 11 perspectives were edited together to produce a single cohesive record of all that transformed.

I invite you as a reader to witness the change giving a morning can produce and as a volunteer to see the transformation you helped create.

Dan Maurath, Corps Member CYSJ

Appreciating one Another – Day two of ATA

This week, City Year San Jose/Silicon Valley is going to focus on something very important: our City Year community. Our students are on “ski week” which gives us the perfect opportunity to build team, celebrate our accomplishments and get ourselves energized for the second half of our service year. Each day we will be posting updates on how Advanced Training Academy (ATA) is going.

One of the most important parts of ATA is having the opportunity to really take some time and appreciate one another.

Today we did an activity called “Touch Someone Who,” which allows people to anonymously appreciate others for some pretty incredible things.

How it works is everyone sits in a circle with their backs facing the inside with their eyes closed. Then 7-10 people are selected to go into the middle of the circle to “touch someone who” they feel relates to a certain statement.

Some of the statements include:

Touch someone who inspires you

Touch someone who brightens your day

Touch someone who you can depend on

The point of the activity is to not only open yourself up to appreciate others for being amazing, but to walk away knowing that people appreciate you.

Other ways we have shown appreciation throughout the week include:

Setting up appreciation bags where people can write appreciations and drop them in.

Doing “random” appreciations in which we draw names and then 3-5 people have the chance to publicly appreciate that person.

Some of these activities may be “squishy” for some, but it generates a strong feeling of community, which is exactly what we need at this point in the year.

Stay tuned for tomorrow’s ATA activities! We are excited to welcome Charlie Rose to give a Dean’s Address and in the evening we have a fabulous talent show complete with singing, dancing and some other great surprises.

Megan Baker, Recruitment Project Leader & Social Media Manager CYSJ

Sunday Ballin’: a San Jose tradition

2010 alum Jesse Blitzstein dribbles down the court during Sunday Ballin' at Roosevelt Park.

Basketball was always a big deal for me.  I started playing in the 8th grade and quickly fell in love with it. Forward 10 years later, I’m in San Jose, CA getting ready to commit to a year of service with City Year where I was able to bring my love of the game to help build our own community.

During non-working hours, I was either thinking about, watching or playing basketball. Without a basketball court in plain sight, I did a lot more watching than playing.  Then there it was; a basketball court at Overfelt High School on the East Side of San Jose. This is where the idea of Sunday Ballin’ was born. We got together a few times that year and had a really great time. Little did I know how much it would grow from there.

Fast forward one year later, I’m back with City Year after a great service year and an even better year for City Year San Jose’s Cyzygy basketball team (we finally passed the first AND second rounds which was something CYSJ never did before). Coming back I was thinking to myself, “We did that well only playing a few times together; how well could we do if we  played every week!?”

So as soon as I found my new home with a basketball hoop and a half-court, I immediately started contacting new corps and staff members to play basketball at Cahill Park.  This became a weekly thing as my weekly mass text titled “Sunday Ballin” would be “Bball at Cahill at 3pm.”

This became a cherished tradition for us to all get together and play basketball and welcoming ALL skill levels. They ranged  from the ballers who played their entire life to those who just started playing basketball that very day.  Of course I wanted it to be as competitive as can be, but I also wanted all of us to come as community and get to know each other more through basketball.

“Sunday Ballin’ ” is not limited to City Year members.  We have all sorts of people playing like Paris from the YMCA, Chad who was in construction and an alum of YMCA, Preston from Rocketship (a charter school program in San Jose), a homeless man named “Ice-man” and so on. We have gone a long way playing in courts such as Cahill Park, Skyport Courts and Roosevelt Park. Going on to its fourth year, we now play every Sunday at Roosevelt Park in downtown San Jose but will soon start playing at Colombus Park near Japantown, San Jose.  It has turned into a great way for corps members to connect with alumni and other people in the San Jose community.

- Jeff Tibayan, Alum CYSJ

Community member inspires a day of service

Typically when City Year has a service event, we recruit the community to come and help. This Saturday, a concerned community member recruited us.

China is a student at San Jose State University and San Jose resident. She frequents Guadalupe Park, a ten mile stretch of bike trails located in the heart of downtown San Jose. Feeling fed up with all of the trash she has seen around the park, China reached out to City Year to help her make a difference.

China’s involvement with service began this past May when she brought a group of teens on a retreat where they participated in trust activities. Ever since then, she’s “caught the bug” and has been involved in planning several service events. This was the first time she had worked with City Year.

“It is so inspiring to see a group of young people come together like this to complete such an important mission,” she said.

With some of our brand new corps members in tow, about 15 City Year folks worked side by side with China and her friends to pick up trash alongside the walkways and the river. But it wasn’t performing the actual service that felt so good for us. It was knowing that there are people in our community who deeply care enough to do something about it, and the fact that they know to reach out to City Year for help.

- Megan Baker, Recruitment Project Leader CYSJ

China discusses the service that took place at the closing circle. Incoming corps member Jackson Starr listens on.

Team Leader Suzi Townsdin cleans up trash at Guadalupe Park.

This service day was the first opportunity for incoming corps members to serve their new community.