Casady Service Learning Joins YSA Summer Service Suggestions

June 8, 2017 | Volume 24, No. 22                             Summer Service Ideas    Summer months bring long days, warm weather, school vacations - and great opportunities for kids to volunteer and families, camps, and youth groups to serve together. Here are some suggestions for a successful service experience: Start with things you love to do. Consider issues you care about.  Combine passions + issues for the biggest impact.  Casady Service Learning will encourage, support, and help your learning and growing through service during the summer. When you're ready to plan your summer, you can find 20 summer service ideas at www.YSA.org/summer          VA Summer of Service This Summer, thank a Veteran and pledge the gift of time. The Department of Veterans Affairs is asking citizens across the country to join in serving our nation's Veterans. HOBY's Advanced Leadership Academy - July 6-11  Application Deadline: June 15 Become a force for good while earning college credit this summer. The Advanced Leadership Academy (ALA) is a college-prep program for high school juniors and seniors who are serious about spearheading positive social change. Participants (known as "Project Managers") select the cause they want to impact, develop their project-management and leadership skills, and then create their unique plan for change to put into action when they return home. Join the ALA July 6-11 at Loyola University Chicago.   GRANTS & AWARDS  9/11 Day of Service Impact School Grants  Deadline: June 26 Grants of up to $1,500 are available to schools participating in YSA's Global Schools of Service program in the United States that use YSA's programs to authentically and meaningfully engage students on national days of service (9/11 Day of Service, MLK Day of Service, and Global Youth Service Day) and help them learn, lead, and achieve. YSA, in partnership with the Corporation for National and Community Service, will select 50 K-12 public schools to receive a grant to support engaging students in a schoolwide service project(s) on 9/11 National Day of Service and Remembrance (Monday, September 11th, 2017). Disney Be Inspired Summer of Service Grants  Deadline: September 30 Youth, ages 5-18, who volunteer to make their communities healthier, greener, and stronger can apply for a $500 Disney Summer of Service grant to create a project or expand their impact throughout the rest of the year. 250 youth-led service projects will be selected and $500 grants will be awarded to each winner's sponsoring organization this fall. Youth who are interested should visit YSA.org/BeInspired to tell their volunteer story, get inspiration and planning resources, and apply for a grant.   APPLY FOR A DISNEY BE INSPIRED SUMMER OF SERVICE GRANT! STORIES OF SERVICE Everyday Young Hero: Ray Wipfli Ray Wipfli (14, La Canada, California) is a compassionate and tenacious young man who works to improve youth soccer skills, promote healthy behaviors, and strengthen global citizenship. He went to Uganda in 2014 with his mother, where he was inspired by the realities of extreme poverty and the power of soccer to break down cultural and linguistic barriers. Ever since, Ray has been working to develop a soccer camp for youth living in rural Uganda. He has now helped over 2,000 kids, and established a non-profit organization, Ray United FC. Ray has raised over $100,000 to make the soccer camp a reality. Nonetheless, over the past 3 years Ray has learned that he cannot change the world by himself. To engage his peers in the US, he launched a RUFC club at his school which hosts an annual Walk-to School and textile drive. In February 2017, Ray led his first Youth Vision Trip in which a small group of American teenagers and their parents joined him on a 10-day service learning trip to Uganda. The trip involved visiting health clinics and RUFC school clubs, participation in community service events, youth exchange, home stays (included sleeping over night with families in mud huts in Northern Uganda), and safari. The trip created new global citizens who, after seeing life outside their bubble, started to care about the wellbeing of those seemingly worlds away. In three short years, Ray returned to Uganda four times to carry out his many projects and, in response to community input, he has also supported the construction of a school block, launched and awarded small grants to RUFC school clubs, brought two youth from Uganda to LA to visit, and found sponsors for nine kids to complete secondary school. Do you know a young person, age 5-25 that is creating extraordinary change in your community? Nominate them for an Everyday Young Hero award. RESOURCES & TRAININGS Youth Guide to the Global Goals Download YSA's Youth Guide to the Global Goals for ways to can use YSA's ASAP Model (Awareness, Service, Advocacy, Philanthropy) to be a part of a worldwide movement of youth-led solutions to global problems.  Read & Act This Summer   Use the Read & Act: Kids Making a Difference collection of inspiring children's books from FirstBook paired with free downloadable discussion guides from YSA to help youth ages 6-12, understand how they can use their unique talents, interests and passions to spark action in their own communities. SERVICE SONG OF THE WEEK "Inspired" - Miley Cyrus  "We are meant for more Pull the handle on the door that opens up to change I know it sounds so strange We are meant for more There's a lock upon the door, but we hold the key to change." The complete Service Songs of the Week playlist from 2012-2017 is at  http://bit.ly/servicesongs

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Editor-in-Chief