Final Reflection on FYSOP 30
It’s been almost two months after the First-Year Student Outreach Project wrapped up its 30thyear. We asked some of this year’s staff leaders to share about their experience with the program. This is a look back at the week of service that kicked off the 2019-2020 academic year.
“I left my first year as FYSTAFF with people I call my “golden friends,” folks who share the general life values I do and also experienced the same week of hectic and fun activities as I did. We all spent a week before FYSOP training together, learning about each other and the program we were soon to be a part of. We went on excursions together to our focus areas which, for us, were Boston’s South End, Roxbury, and Kenmore/Fenway. We all led groups of first-years around Boston trying to learn the basics of college while showing them the city beyond BU. Every time I participate in a program at the CSC, I legitimately live with new people in my life and experiences that I do not believe I could get anywhere else.” –Eli Panetta, First-time FYSOP Staff Leader for Hub of the Solar System
“I love being a part of FYSOP because the program gives everyone a more well-rounded perspective of the city, and also introduces first year students to being active citizens right when they arrive in Boston. First years get to learn about the systemic issues that many populations within the city experience, and how getting involved and serving their new community can help people. Being from the greater Boston area, I thought I knew a lot about city before coming to BU, but FYSOP has helped me to learn more about communities in need and how our service can help!” – Abby Faria, Staff Leader for City of Champions
“This year was my first time volunteering with FYSOP as a Staff Leader. The last time I was in FYSOP was as a volunteer in 2016. The experience was totally different from the first time I volunteered. The program became much more community-centered. As a staff leader, I thought a lot more about our impact on the community and was much more intentional with my service.” –Emma Bianculli, First-time FYSOP Staff Leader for City of Champions
“FYSOP gave me a new perspective on what it means to call a place home. Usually, when I get asked where home is, I say Long Island, New York. It’s where I grew up, it’s where I feel most comfortable: not to be myself, necessarily, but just to exist. But, if the meaning of home was as simple as a place where you feel comfortable and know your way around, then that wouldn’t really apply to everyone, right? And that’s where I think FYSOP comes in. Not all of us have a physical place that inherently feels like home. Some of us do, some of us have people, some of us have a lot of places that mean something to us but not one that feels like the pinnacle of familiarity. But FYSOP lets us connect with Boston in a real, tangible way, in a way that a lot of us probably don’t even know our hometowns. It makes the city visible beyond just being the place outside the BU bubble. I don’t think you can really know a place until you’ve experienced it in the way FYSOP allows you to. It’s one thing to be a student at BU, and a student living in Boston, but it’s another to be an active citizen within both of those communities, to be someone who not only knows about the issues surrounding them but knows about them in a way that they can communicate them to other people, because they’ve worked with organizations and learned from them and explored the places they call home.” – Nicole Sancilio, Staff Leader for City of Champions