For Winsor School student Taylor Evans, lending a helping hand is second nature.
Besides having a hectic schedule which includes several extracurricular activities, Evans spends her free time helping others.
Once a week for the past two years, Evans, 17, a junior at the Boston private school, has tutored students in math at the Mather Elementary School in Dorchester.
Every Wednesday after school, about 20 Winsor students are paired with third- or fourth-grade students. Evans and her peers help them with homework or tutor them in specific subjects.
"It's fun to spend time with the kids and I have formed special relationships with my 'tutees,"' Evans said. "The kids are so excited to see the tutors each week, and they share stories about their families and friends. If you are sick one week, they always ask when you return and why you were not there."
Evans also volunteers at Greater Boston Food Bank, packaging food to be distributed to soup kitchens throughout Boston. At Pine Street Inn homeless shelter in Boston, she helps prepare food for Saturday brunch or hosts a Friday "game night" with bingo.
The community service program Evans said she is most involved in is at the Horizons for Homeless Children Family House in Roxbury. Every Thursday, Evans and a group of friends manage a play area for children ages 2-12.
"We work on craft projects and homework with some of the older kids and play games with the younger children while their parents are taking classes or attending a community meeting," Evans said. "We get to really know the children of Family House. Each time we visit, they always rush down to come play with us. It is difficult when the children who we have spent time with for nearly a year leave, but we are happy to know that they are moving into new homes."
Now Evans plans to help those in need halfway across the world.
In 2005, Evans took a trip with her family to Africa, one that had a profound effect on her life.
"We spent our entire time there with a representative from City Year, a non-governmental organization headquartered in Boston with a branch in Johannesburg. Our guide, Thulani Madondo, gave us a tour of his city and township, Soweto," Evans said. "We saw the Apartheid Museum and the home that Nelson Mandela lived in ... the thing I remember most was our trip into Kliptown, one of the poorest sections of Soweto."
Evans said she spent an entire day at a community center called Soweto Kliptown Youth, run by a community leader named Bob Nameng.
"Bob thanked us for traveling beyond the usual tourist route," she said. "He reminded us that visiting Soweto had been illegal for white people during apartheid. He told us that there was no electricity in the tin shacks and the street lamps were a recent addition. He also showed us the one local water tap that served several hundred houses and one of the community's few port-a-potties."
Evans said the 2005 trip inspired her to one day return to Africa and to help fight poverty. Recently Evans got involved in the 2008 HERO Youth Ambassador program to do just that.
HERO is a campaign of the United Nations Association of the USA that provides school-based support to children living in African communities hit by the AIDS virus.
"I learned about the 2008 HERO Youth Ambassador program while reading my sister's CosmoGIRL! magazine. There was a short section about the program at the bottom of a page and a Web address," she said. "I remember dropping off the application at the downtown Boston post office at 9:30 p.m. on March 1, the day the application was due. I never thought I would be chosen."
Evans said she received a call in late March and was told she was selected as one of 22 students from the United States and Canada to participate.
On July, those students will travel to South Africa and Namibia to volunteer working in HERO-supported schools, including Evans.
The Ambassadors will help build homes and fences, playgrounds, paint existing schools and offer programs to improve the lives of orphans and other children.
"I am going back to Africa for six weeks," she said. "Hopefully our work will improve the lives of children who have been affected by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. I really hope to make a difference in the lives of the children in some way, whether it is by making them laugh or helping them receive a better education."
Jeff Gilbride can be reached at 781-398-8005 or at jgilbrid@cnc.com
