On the 1st Day as an ASC...

So when you graduate from a liberal arts school with a B.A. in English lit and want to save the world but have no idea where to start... what do you do?

Answer: If you're me, you move in with 8 ("underpriveliged"? "at risk"? "in-need"? "underserviced"? you decide) teenage girls in a rich suburb of Illinois.

I joined this non-for-profit organization, which I will call Organization X, as a "Volunteer Academic Success Coordinator." I would have written that in the blog title, rather than the crude "Unpaid ASC," but it didn't fit in the space. I don't blame the space... it's a pretty lofty title for a 22-year-old kid fresh out of college who now spends 75% of her time confiscating cell phones and driving teenagers to play practice.

After nearly a month of training everywhere from Nebraska to my own backyard, I started my first official week at Organization X last week.

I don't know about you, but Christmas carols get stuck in my head all. year. round. So I put together a little carol to summerize my first week at Organization X. I'll spare both of us the pain of typing the whole thing out and skip to the last verse:


On the 12th day as an ASC, my true love gave to me,
12 Illinois employees, 11+ hours of TCI*
10 dollars in my account**, 9 drafts of the schedule,
8 awesome scholars, 7 of them whining, 6 pieces of mail,
5 books on backorder! an occasional 4-day weekend,
3 envelope compliments***, 2 parking tickets****,
and a house meeting on my day off!


*TCI stands for Theraputic Crisis Intervention training. And man is it boring... except for the mildly entertaining, horrible acting in the videos.

**Ok ten dollars might be a little hyperbolic. I'm really worried about money, is my point. And yet I keep spending it...

***Each scholar and staff member has an envelope with her name on it and we give each other written compliments. I try to give at least one a day. It's a great pick-me up.

****Yes I have really gotten 2 parking tickets within a week of each other. Driving here has been a problem for me. Toto, we're not in Indianapolis anymore...


By the way, I didn't mean for this post to be completely sardonic. I of course have some frusturations with my job, but I'm glad I'm here. I love the scholars, and my co-workers are great. It feels like I'm supposed to be here.

--Rebecca