Looking back.....and ahead

As many days in our lives seem to endlessly drag on, it is truly amazing to realize how quickly this coop semester flew by. It seems as though it was yesterday that I was walking into Curry and sitting at a table with four other random students getting to learn more about ourselves and exactly what we would be doing for Sport in Society. The friendship that has blossomed between my coworkers and me at Sport in Society is extremely similar to the friendships and professional relationships that I have built at the Wang YMCA. As a YMCA that is extremely rich in culture, I can honestly say that I was very nervous when I was first assigned to this branch. I had gone to high school relatively close to Hyde Park and was much more familiar with the area and its inhabitants. Chinatown was literally foreign territory to me and like most people; I wasn’t so much scared as I was feeling unprepared for what was to come. My first couple weeks at the Wang seem like a blur to me now as I was meeting all these people for the first time in a setting that I was not one hundred percent comfortable with yet. As time went by, I began to become more acclimated to my surroundings and began to build friendships with the staff of the Wang YMCA. They welcomed Lucy and I into their facility and treated us as if we had been working there as long as they had had. If there is one thing that is constant for every students’ coop it is the fact that the people who you work with on a daily basis and the professional relationships that you build along the way are the key factors behind whether a student has a fun and rewarding experience as opposed to a miserable and monotonous six months. I was fortunate enough to work alongside an incredibly gifted staff at Sport in Society and an equally great staff at the Wang YMCA. The only regret I have about this entire experience is that it has to end in roughly two weeks from today.

Explaining my experience at Sport in Society to one of my family members or friends is not an easy task by any means. To them, my mentioning of daily playing kickball and pickup basketball games often overshadows the curriculums and trainings I’ve facilitated and how much character I have built throughout this semester. Accepting this coop and working for Sport in Society for the past six months has literally changed my life and separated me from the path I thought I was on back in November of 2010. Eight months ago I was an unemployed, twenty-one year old pre-law student with a desired future path that would include five more years of school and six figures worth of lifetime debt. Sport in Society gave me that swift kick in the behind that I needed and opened my eyes to a future profession that lets me do the three things I love most: be involved with sports, help people and wake up every morning with a smile on my face. I am truly in debt to the entire organization that is Sport in Society and the people who comprise it.