Michigan’s AmeriCorps Member Council – Posting #31

Welcome back, this is Christine Sisung from the 4-H Mentor Michigan Initiative. I just had the opportunity to spend this past weekend at the 4-H Mentoring Weekend in Tustin, Michigan. While all my body wanted to do was fall asleep in my bed for at least the next 12 hours, my mind had a very different idea. It was still abuzz with all the fun and excitement I witnessed different mentoring matches and AmeriCorps members from the 4-H Mentor Michigan Initiative have over the past three days. Highlights included watching everyone throwing red and green Jell-O at each other during the Jell-O wars, mentees and mentors showing off various talents during the talent show, and witnessing matches complete the Amazing Mentoring Challenge. The words amazing, great, fun, unforgettable, and thanks for the memories keep popping into my head. One of my personal highlights from the weekend was seeing different mentees really open up to everyone over the weekend.

The same thing can be said about an AmeriCorps term of service. We each come into the year inside our shell, not really knowing what to expect and then coming out of our year or two with a wide-open shell. For example, when I started my service in January 2008, AmeriCorps service was something that sounded like a good way to find more job experience and give back to the community I grew up in. Now, as I am rounding out my second year, I have a new perspective on life and new ideas of where I want to go. Through spending nearly two years serving my community, I have come to realize that while I want to work with children, being a classroom teacher is not for me. Instead, I want to do something that is going to support youth outside of school and help them realize their potential. This past weekend I witnessed exactly how two mentees involved in my program have started to realize their potential.

When both of the mentees got involved in the program it was like pulling teeth to get them to try a new activity with their mentor. This past weekend was all about trying new things for them. For example, one of the mentees kept saying she didn’t want to try the Jell-O war when we got to the field to start. So she and I made a deal that she would try it for five minutes and if she wasn’t having fun she could come stand by me on the sidelines. She never joined me on the sidelines and the Jell-O war ended up being her favorite session.

Just as my mind is filled with excitement from the weekend, everyone else who attended is also thinking about the amazing, fun, unforgettable things that occurred. The same thing can be said for my year of service. It has been an unforgettable year and a half so far and I can’t wait to see the things the AmeriCorps members who follow me will do. The foundation is set and now the sky is the limit for them, just as it was for me when I started in 2008. As each member packs up to leave our year we may be physically tired, just as matches were leaving mentoring weekend, but our mind is full from the excitement we experienced and the things we helped accomplish.