I believe that the position of a person that helps to teach others is one of great responsibility because it impacts the lives of those children. Teaching helps to provide them with some future success. Participating in programs that help to facilitate understanding and learning deeply impacts the students lives as much as it does my own. When children are provided with this type of inspiration and motivation to succeed, I believe that it will help encourage them to create dreams and an innate drive to achieve them.

During the summer of 2009, I spent three weeks participating in community service in San Juan, Argentina at the San Cayetano Community Center. While there I worked with native Argentine children each day, apportioning and distributing breakfast for them, preparing their lunch, and teaching them English. These 20 children ranged in ages from 3 to 16 years old, and none of them had any English in their vocabulary before we arrived. Thus, the challenge to communicate with them was great, but the rewards were even greater when I was able to do so. Although I only had three weeks to share with these children, I believe that the information I shared with them helped build a foundation for their future, and not only inspired them to learn more of the English language, but also motivated them to excel in learning new information in order to excel in their lives. I believe that this principle can be applied to promoting the understanding of any subject.

My San Cayetano experience was truly unique and one that I am grateful to have been given. It inspired me to want to find commonalities with all children of the world and help them to excel by any means necessary. It especially has motivated me to find more children like those in Argentina whom I can help in a holistic way to promote their success and well-being, so that they, too, will learn to appreciate and embrace their learning capabilities in order to thrive and achieve their dreams.