Throughout the past few years, VT Seva has been gaining more traction both on the impact it creates nationwide and regarding the number of volunteers that are involved in this organization. Especially during the pandemic, as meetings were held online, it was more accessible for teenagers and adults to take part in. With schools back to in-person-learning this year, youth VT Seva volunteers have developed a new goal in mind: to not only increase nationwide membership, but to foster diversity within the organization.
Fostering diversity is important because when there are volunteers from different backgrounds and experiences, they can contribute their unique ideas towards making VT Seva even more successful in the incredible impact it makes. In order to achieve this goal, VT Seva youth have started/founded “VT Seva Clubs” at their respective high schools and have motivated their classmates to contribute towards VT Seva’s cause through their school branch.
So far there have been 4 high school VT Seva clubs around the nation:
VT Seva Club at Alpharetta High School in Atlanta, Georgia - founded in March 2017
Srikar, a high school sophomore, started a VTS club called “VTS Coding Coach” at Alpharetta High School through the VT Seva Atlanta State branch. His club aims to empower youth to be able to adapt to changing technology, Srikar along with this team (Dhereraj Eidnani, Manoj Niverthi, Anand Krishnan, and David Zhang) teach Java programming to students at their school for 45 minutes once a week at their high school campus and host library sessions every other week. Srikar and his team continue to inspire their fellow classmates and community to serve through the art of teaching.
(Pictures published at the courtesy of Ocee Library from North Fulton County)
VT Seva Club at Liberty Highschool in Renton, Washington - founded in October 2018
Chinmay Koimuttum and Aakarsh Dhilip founded a VTS branch at their highschool in order to increase volunteer engagement in their community. They informed members about service events the VTS Seattle branch was taking part in and motivated their peers to serve for the benefit of their community.
VT Seva Club at Skyline High School in Sammamish, Washington - founded in September 2021
Srihari Krishnaswamy and I (Aditi Srinivasan) from the VT Seva Seattle branch co-founded a VTS club at our high school with the goal fostering more cultural diversity within the organization. We meet every other Wednesday after school for one hour and put together lesson plans to teach members from all ethnicities and backgrounds to identify their passion, brainstorm a non-profit initiative, scale it up through effective marketing, and donate proceeds collected from those projects to VT Seva Seattle’s cause of helping educate underprivileged children. Srihari and I lead meeting plans while our friends Neha Aithiraju, Rishi Sharma, and Pavan Kotti help make the club more visible to the school community through marketing and outreach. We hope to spread a message to our classmates that service should be something that one does willingly, focusing on the impact created rather than the reward.
VT Seva Club at Lambert High School in Atlanta, GA - August 2021
VT Seva Youth Volunteers founded a chapter at Lambert High this fall and have helped increase VTS engagement through their school community.
We hope to see many more high school VTS clubs like these in the years to come. Speaking from personal experience, it has been amazing to have the guidance of such caring adults here at Seattle VT Seva, and I wouldn’t have been able to become the leader I am today and make the impact I have been able to make without their tips and advice. I feel a duty to help empower more teenagers' from various ethnic backgrounds at my high school and pass on the knowledge I obtained from the VTS adult volunteers to new rising youth volunteers. I hope to see VT Seva's footprint expand even further and become more culturally diverse during the process. Let’s magnify our impact with one more club at a time!
- Aditi Srinivasan VTSeva Seattle Youth Board
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