Victoria Glidden

Even though her family does not have much, Victoria Glidden, an 11-year-old from Boston, MA, does everything she can to improve the lives of thousands of other children in her community.

Victoria was elected as one of twelve Red Sox “Kid Nation Captains.” As a captain, she worked with a team to volunteer her time and gather supplies like winter apparel for less fortunate children in Boston. With the help of her friends and family she collected 350 coats. When Victoria added her contribution with the rest of the Kid Nation Captains, they had more than 1,000 winter items for children.

In the fall Victoria volunteered her time to a school supplies drive for less fortunate children with the Kid Nation Captains. Victoria single handedly collected more than 4,000 items that in turn helped to fill 2,000 backpacks with supplies. Accompanied by her fellow captains, Victoria spent a whole day at Fenway Park handing out the backpacks to students. The project required her attention for most of a summer, but she was more than happy to do it in order to help other children.

At such a young age, and living with not much, Victoria has worked with a team to improve the lives of many children throughout the city of Boston.

Joy Wright

Anna Wherry

Planting the seeds of community is something for which 17 year-old Anna Wherry has a passion. In addition to attending high school and volunteering with the Baltimore Medical System, Anna has been working to make life in the United States easier for a group of Bhutanese refugees.

Anna has worked to introduce urban farming techniques to members of a refugee community in Baltimore, whose citizens suffer from insufficient access to food. After meeting Khada Nanda Upret, a Nepali refugee from Bhutan, Anna discovered that many Bhutanese refugees grew up surviving on their crops. Because there was a lack of space for gardening in Baltimore, Anna helped the refugees find a place near their community to set up a garden. The plot of land they found was run by Regional Management Inc., a property management company.

The owners of Regional Management Inc. support a former Provisional Accelerated Learning (PAL) center called the Goodnow Community Center. The refugees were already familiar with the Center because of its educational and recreational resources. Civic Works, Baltimore’s service corps, helped the Center obtain sod cutting and tilling equipment while Regional Management’s buildings and grounds staff helped the Bhutanese operate the equipment. Anna, with her supervisor's help, submitted an application to the Parks & People Foundation for the Bhutanese refugees to acquire seedlings and garden equipment.

Through Anna’s work, the Bhutanese refugees now have the Karesa Bari Community Garden, a plot of land where they can plant crops and other plants. “When you observe the Bhutanese families digging and planting in the earth, it is apparent that there is something important taking place,” Anna said. She said she cannot believe how quickly the project took off and feels like something was at work to bring all of these special people together for one common goal. When Anna ponders how the Bhutanese will feel when they harvest their first crop from American soil, she hopes it will nourish their stomachs and their souls.

Andrea Aitken

In order for the military to be successful, it is imperative soldiers can rest easy knowing their families are safe and taken care of. Andrea Aitken assures this by sharing her experiences about army life with new spouses and helping them cope with the challenges they will face. By giving back to the military community, she is sharing strength with the ones left behind and allowing soldiers to complete their missions without distractions and worries about their home life.

Andrea is the president of the Spouses Club in Stuttgart, Germany. Under her leadership, the club has 22 board positions and raises money to give back to the community. In one year alone, the organization gave more than $40,000 in college scholarships to high school students and more than $9,000 thousand to community programs like the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts.

Along with being involved with the Spouses Club, Andrea is also a leader of the Afericom Family Readiness Group. She mobilizes volunteers in Africa to provide an opportunity for military stationed there to communicate with their families at the military command center in Stuttgart.

Andrea is a recipient of the Presidential Volunteer award for surpassing 2,000 hours of volunteering in one year and was named the Military Spouse of the Year in Stuttgart in 2008. For this, Andrea is a Daily Point of Light.

Farrah Overman

With her strong passion to help others and devotion to volunteer work, Farrah Overman has made a huge, lasting impact in her local Army community.

There are few volunteer opportunities in the community that Farrah isn’t engaged in. She works almost full-time as the Army community service voluneer coordinator mananging more than 25 volunteers. She assists the volunteer coordinator with training new volunteers and administrative tasks. In addition, she volunteers as a coach for the school wrestling team, teaching self-defense classes to teens and Army spouses. Her activies also include PTSA president, Army Family Team Building (AFTB) Master Trainer, and Girl Scout co-leader. She is also the publicity chair for the Community Club and managed the operations center at the past Army Family Action Plan conference.

As PTSA president, she helped raise money for scholarships and to order new equipment for the school. Her self-defense classes helped ensure that women in the community are prepared to defend themselves. Her work with Army Family Action Plan helps bring to light issues affecting the entire community. As an AFTB instructor, she provides training to new spouses so they understand all the programs available to then and how to use those programs effectively.

Farrah’s humor, passion, drive and ability to keep the end goal in sight are just a few of the qualities that make her great volunteer. For this, Farrah is a Daily Point of Light.

Alexis Paza

Corey Castillo

When many can barely make time for themselves, Corey Castillo, has found time to do something special for others. Already a busy kid, somewhere between marching band, basketball, track, science club, and numerous other activities, Corey Castillo helps the elderly, veterans, and even his peers in his community.

One such way was cleaning up a local cemetary. Years of neglect and three major hurricanes had left the Edgerly Cemetary in disarray. To fix this, Corey organized 90 volunteers from schools, churches, and other organizations his community to help with the clean-up the trash and debris which took three weeks.

Working with his Boy Scout Troop, he has dedicated time to City of Refuge, a 1950’s motel that has become a home for veterans. He and his fellow scouts were charged with helping other organizations build new cabins, and demolish parts of the old hotel.

He has helped veterans even further through a program called “Remember Our Veterans”. He and his fellow scouts went to the homes of sick or disabled veterans, and helped them repair and maintain their households. They also visited the homes of their widows.

Corey has also setup a Crime Prevention program for his fellow teens. The program focuses on teaching teens about tobacco and alcohol use, sexual predators, sexual abuse, child abuse, teen driving and accidents, shoplifting, and illegal drug use. He organizes the meetings and provides snacks.

Another project Corey had a major hand in was the “Smoke Alarms, Home Inspections, and Fire Safety” In years past, the local fire department had run the project to inspect the homes of senior citizens for fire safe. However, they could no longer afford to provide their homes with smoke and CO2 alarms. Working with banks, the VFW, American Legion, and other local organizations, Corey raised the funds for the alarms. He and the fire chief made a list of senior members of their community, and made sure their homes were prepared in case of a fire emergency.

Corey’s work in the community has impacted many. People who visit Edgerely Cemetary no long have to worry about trash and debris when visiting loved ones. Veterans and their widows are living safely and securely in their homes. He has even helped teach his fellow teens about crime and how it affects them and their community. Acting alone or with a group, Corey found a way to lend a helping hand into the hearts of his community.

Leadership Southwestern

Leadership Southwestern is one of three service learning organizations at Southwestern College in Winfield, KS.

Leadership Southwestern addresses many needs for the Winfield community. It is a true student-lead endeavor that provides students with a combination of class work and service projects. The team also takes a service trip each year, rotating around different needs for various communities, outside Winfield. Local partnerships play a key role in meeting community needs in the organization’s servant leadership practice. Some of the lasing partnerships include: Big Brother Big Sisters, First United Methodist Church, the Health Department, Winfield Recreational Commission, and the American Red Cross. The service projects depend on the need of the community and the passions of the leaders involved.

Each member of Leadership Southwestern is committed to making a positive difference and leaving an impactful legacy. By recognizing the power of service they accept many responsibilities and in fulfilling these responsibilities, they are loyal to and respect each other as they strive to obtain their personal missions.

Peri Pezzano

Kindness Counts

Kindness Counts is a hands-on service organization located in Conneticut in which middle school students volunteer their time to help homebound seniors, local homeless shelters, residents of rest homes, challenged neighbors, and many others. The organization reaches out to at risk children who are struggling with school, homelife, etc. and teaches them good manners and the value of giving back to the community.

Members of Kindness Counts have faciliated a unique program called "Darien a Darien: un solo mundo." This initiative was designed to build a virtual bridge between the children of Darien, CT, and the remote, sparsely-populated, and severely disadvantaged province of Darien, Panama. The organization has put on several benefit events donating proceeds to building a library and fully-equipped computer lab for the local school they sponsor, La Escuela Nicanor. Funds raiesed by Kindness Counts also went toward remodeling the schools kitchens, dining hall, and classrooms. La Escuela Nicanor is now connected to the internet and able to video conference with the students in Conneticut. The students in Panama are very thankful to Kindness Counts for the opportunity to see the world around them through the internet.

Kindness Counts is the only service group to facilitate “good manners and gracious behavior” training to the children before venturing out to help others.