Sofia Kwon, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Newark Volunteer
If there’s one thing teenagers can relate to, it’s that we are busy. From doing homework to studying for standardized tests to playing sports and instruments, we have a lot to do. Volunteering just seems like one more thing we have to balance.
I certainly thought this at the beginning of high school. As I got older, I learned more about the world around me and I became increasingly angry over national and international injustices. I noticed this same pattern with my peers. The more we learned from school, the news, and each other, the more we started to care about relevant social issues. With that newfound engagement was a desire to reach out and do our part to make the world a better place.
My first major community service experience was chairing a committee at my school that planned a charity 5K run for International Day of the Girl. Proceeds of the event went to a nonprofit, BlinkNow, that supports a girls’ school and women’s shelter in Kopila Valley, Nepal. Planning this 5K took an extreme amount of hard work and dedication. My peers and I spent hours upon hours contacting sponsors, advertising the event, making gift bags and T-shirts, and planning every detail to a tee. The event was the first 5K my school ever planned and over 200 people registered. On the day of the event, we had a representative from BlinkNow speak about her organization. As she talked about the school in Kopila Valley, I felt immense pride. I had done something. I had planned something successful that would help girls across the ocean. I had taken my passion for empowering women and turned it into something that would have a very tangible impact.
That, ultimately, is what community service is about and why it’s so important for young people to do. What I love about my generation is our passion for achieving social justice and improving this world, one issue at a time. Community service is the perfect opportunity to take that passion and desire and make concrete change.
For a long time, I’d taken for granted the fact that I always had a roof over my head. As I learned more about epidemics of poverty and homelessness, I realized I wanted to do my part to make a change, just like I had wanted to do my part when I planned the 5K. When you volunteer with Habitat for Humanity, you are doing an unquantifiable amount of change. Habitat for Humanity isn’t just about building houses, although that is a huge part of the organization’s mission. It’s also about the other aspects of home ownership that I again took for granted, like critical repairs and smoke alarm installation. These are essential parts of a home that many families simply cannot afford. It’s because of volunteers who build homes, hold fundraisers, and help Habitat for Humanity promote its mission and vision that the organization is able to make an indelible impact on the lives of families everywhere.