Throughout the YES year, students engage in community service activities that inspire them to create, organize, and develop their own social good projects. Volunteering their time towards a good cause stirs up their passion to make a difference during their exchange year. Kashaf Mujeeb (Pakistan, YES 2016-2017, hosted by World Link in Visalia, CA) talks about what she did to spark change in her host community.

I volunteered at the Visalia Rescue Mission in Visalia, CA (my host town). The Visalia Rescue Mission is a faith-based, non-profit organization that serves its community with life-changing programs, emergency shelters, and meals. While volunteering there, I was saddened by the reality of the homeless people I encountered who did not have enough clothing to keep them warm during the cold Fall season. I thought about how most of us are so fortunate to have and how others do not have enough. 

In an effort to help people who are homeless in my host community, I started a project called “Fall into T-Shirts”. Through this project, my goal was to provide clothing to members of our community who are in need. I created flyers and posted them in my high school, elementary schools, community center, and my host mom’s office to encourage the community to donate gently used t-shirts to the project. I also reached out to friends on social media for online donations. With the help of my host community, I was able to collect over 120 t-shirts which will all be donated to the Visalia Rescue Mission. My goal was to distribute these donations at the very end of October but, thankfully, people in my community still want to donate! So I will be distributing these donations by mid-December. I am hoping that more t-shirts will continue to be donated to this cause.