Americorps at SERVES

Hi Everybody -

This past week, we Americorps Volunteers all carpooled over to "the Palm Springs of Washington" - that's right, beautiful Yakima! There we embarked on a voyage of self-discovery, leadership, and convention food.

Jamie, Josh, Daniel, Cam Tu, and I attended various sessions on working with students, serving our community, and learning basic procedures for operating Red Cross shelters in the case of an emergency. I personally enjoyed a very good session on using creative methods to reach students of all ages. At this session, I learned about using visual arts, freewriting, and intentional group discussions to better understand people's points of views and to better communicate.

All in all, I say the time at SERVES (I don't know what it stands for) was well spent. But, we definitely missed all of the students here at Peace during this past week. Thank goodness for all of our part-time volunteers stepping up to the plate and filling the center with a good energy and a teaching spirit.

Hopefully somebody took pictures of this event. If so, they will be posted soon!

Ryan