Stephen Caldwell's Space » Volunteering

Committed to Excellence

Stephen — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 13:48:27 +0000

The last couple of Thursdays I’ve been volunteering at a program called X-Cel which helps people prepare for their GED exams. I helped the students with their math preparation as a tutor. The organization has it pretty well organized. Each room has a purpose which covers a particular aspect of the requisite curriculum for the exam. They start at addition & subtraction and work their way through to algebra. I’ve helped out in the Decimals room where the students learn to do addition, multiplication, subtraction & division with decimals with and without word problems.

Volunteering there is really quite satisfying and I hope to continue doing it for a while. It’s experiences like these that make me want to get into teaching.

Time Off For Good Behavior

Stephen — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 14:47:08 +0000

This past Tuesday I volunteered at the Prison Book Program, currently located in the basement of the United First Parish Church in Quincy, MA. Prisoners from around the country send the program letters asking for books on various subjects. The volunteers read the letters and attempt to choose books that meet the prisoners’ criteria. Unfortunately, it isn’t always possible to give the inmate what it is they looking for. They sometimes pick subjects that aren’t commonly stocked in the library which consist entirely of donated books.

Another really interesting aspect is the church that this organization operates in. The United First Parish Church is the church that the Adams family, as in the second U.S. president John Adams and sixth U.S. president John Quincy Adams, the first father-son presidential family, attended. Their tombs are actually located under the church. While there one of the members of the Prison Book Program gave us an impromptu tour, but during the Spring, Summer, and Fall they have regular tours through the church which expunges greater detail about the history of the Adams family and the United First Parish Church.

I definitely suggest taking the opportunity to participate in the Prison Book Program and visiting the church.

39 Steps & 37 Signals .. sorta

Stephen — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 03:28:39 +0000

So, I joined Boston Cares some months ago. They are a volunteering organization where you can pick and choose the projects that you do. I’ve been volunteering about twice a month for the Friday Night Supper program at the Arlington St. church at the corner of Boylston St. & Arlington St. in Boston. It’s a lot of fun and the people are really nice. In addition to traditional volunteering things there are also projects that are not quite as humanitarian. Last Sunday I volunteered by helping register participants in Hub On Wheels. And tomorrow I’m going to be ushering at the Huntington Theater Company’s production of 39 Steps.

In addition I’ve gotten an idea for a new project that I’m going to work on for a bit involving Ruby and Ruby On Rails. I’ll provide more info about that later.

I’ve also started reading the book to one of my favorite movies: American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis.