Service in the City: City Year DC

What is City Year?

City Year is a non-profit organization that unites 17-24 year olds for a year of full time service which provides them the skills and the opportunity to change the world by serving as tutors, role models and mentors.

Our role is to promote civic engagement among young people and develop our corps members to be future leaders.

What do your volunteers do here in DC?

One of our biggest issues is fighting illiteracy. Our volunteers currently provide group and one-on-one literacy tutoring to 6,000 DC school children.

We also have a group of volunteers that promote HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention. Those volunteers visit schools throughout DC and teach a CDC-approved curriculum that gives students information about how to prevent HIV transmission and clarifies social stigmas surrounding the disease.

We also have a civic engagement program that organizes physical service throughout the community. By painting murals, planting garden boxes, building benches or cleaning up parks, we improve the physical appearance of the community.

A key element of the civic engagement program is that the corps members recruit and organize members of the community to participate in the service projects. For example, if a law firm came to us and said that it had 100 employees who want to spend a day doing community service, we arrange a project and a date and obtain all the necessary supplies so that when the volunteers show up, they can get straight to work.

What motivates someone to take a year off from college or work to volunteer with City Year?

We believe that service is a right of passage and we envision a day when national service will unite all all citizens in a shared civic experience. We hope that one of the most common questions among young people will become “Where did you do your service?”

Taking a year off for service is becoming increasingly common, and we are trying to change the vernacular from “year off” to “year on.”

What kinds of background do your volunteers come from?

We place a great emphasis on diversity and inclusiveness, and our corps reflects that. We have graduates from liberal arts colleges in the midwest working with people who just finished high school or their GED here in Washington, DC.

Our volunteers come from diverse backgrounds across the board of race, gender and socio-economic status.

What skills do City Year volunteers develop and what kinds of things do they go on to do later?

Part of our mission is to develop young leaders who are civically engaged, and once a week we pull them out of service for leadership development training that focuses on project management, public speaking, computer literacy and other skills.

Whether they go on to college, law school, other community organizations or the private sector, we have noticed that they do take away an experience that affects their career choices and makes them more civic-minded.

What is the biggest challenge that City Year faces as an organization?

There is a tremendous demand for us to grow. DC Public Schools is asking us to put more members in their schools. Doing that puts greater demands on our budget, which means we need to increase our fundraising in an economy that is rather precarious. Since we are a non-profit every dollar we spend is a dollar we have to raise.

What is the biggest challenge your volunteers face?

It is a big commitment and sacrifice for our volunteers. They do a full-time job, working 40-50 hours a week in a challenging environment – the DC public school system - with minimal compensation. So they live on very modest means. But that is also part of what makes is such a powerful experience for them.

What is one goal you have for City Year over the next couple years?

I'll name two. First, I want to increase our exposure in DC. We've done a pretty good job getting the word out, but I want City Year to be a household name.

Second, we are always looking to increase our impact. We have 85 corps members this year, and we will have 100 next year, but we could really use 200 to accomplish what we want to in the community. We need to bring down the HIV/AIDS rate in DC, which is currently one of the highest in nation. The drop out rate in DC public schools continues to hover around 40-50 percent, but the new Chancellor Michelle Rhee has been making great strides in this area and part of that is the impact of our volunteers acting as role models and mentors.

How can people get involved and support City Year?

They can start by visiting our website which has information about opportunities for service. I would especially encourage German citizens who are living or visiting here to get involved – I think that would be a unique experience.

We also have a regular series of Open House events called “Breakfast of Champions.” Every one is welcome to visit us and have breakfast with some of our volunteers, who make a presentation about our work in the community.

City Year DC