You may wonder, is she qualified?

During the last two years I have volunteered for HERO’s for Children,an organization that works with children whose families are affected by HIV/AIDS. The organization has a program called Rising Hero’s where once per month the children are brought together for a day to learn various life skills. Through this program, I volunteered as a “buddy”whereby I pick the kids up from their homes and act as a big sister to them through the day, helping them understand the subject being taught to them and ensuring they remain on task with their projects. I worked primarily with children six to eight years old and enjoyed the challenge of redirecting their contagious energy towards completing their designated projects. The various subjects the children learned about included study habits, self confidence, self esteem, and money management. Through this program I have learned to cultivate patience and have been inspired by the resilience of children.

While in college, I spent one semester studying in Ghana, West Africa. During that time, I spent a couple hours per week in a third grade-level classroom assisting the teacher with English and math. This experience instilled in me a greater understanding of the unique differences in education in an African country versus the United States. Though I can imagine that education in Rwanda is still very different than in Ghana, I believe that I can pull from that experience when helping the Rwanda children.

Another cause I have been very passionate about is ending the genocide in Darfur, Sudan. I have volunteered the previous three years with the Darfur Urgent Action Coalition of Georgia to help spread the word about the atrocities in Darfur and to work with other community volunteers to push through legislative change here in Georgia, even organizing a rally-day at the state capitol with various high school government classes.

All of the above experiences have cultivated traits such as patience, understanding, tolerance, and appreciation, all of which I believe would be essential for this Children’s Program in Rwanda. In addition to these, I am an organized and driven person who believes in seeing a project through completion, if not through Plan A, then through Plan B, whether applied in day-to-day experiences or long term projects.