Every Jan. 1, we introduce our readers to a half-dozen unsung heroes who are doing their parts to make Boston a better place. Here are six folks who might inspire us as we make our New Year's resolutions.
Antwan Avant
Antwan Avant, having finished emptying trash at the Dorchester Youth Alternative Academy, where he is a student, pulls a knit cap over his head and an oversize jacket over his oversize shirt in preparation for his weekly trip to Kit Clark Senior Services. Antwan is a wiry 13-year-old who dreams of playing football for Ohio State University and then in the National Football League and, if that proves elusive, of becoming an auto mechanic. Every Friday afternoon he and a few classmates lead bingo at Kit Clark's adult day health program."Every time we come in, they start smiling," Antwan says. "It just makes me feel good knowing that I'm helping people."
Antwan comes to the 12-pupil alternative middle school after a history of truancy. He's been volunteering at the senior center since April, but his school has been sending students to Kit Clark for 16 years and holds its commencement exercises there. On their short walk up Dorchester Avenue, Antwan and three classmates and two faculty members pass the Fields Corner traffic island that the school has adopted. Students keep it clean, and in the spring they plant flowers cultivated in their greenhouse.
When the group arrives at Kit Clark, Willie Mae Dance, 69, looks up. "We were waiting for you," she says. "Hi, guys." She's seen many academy students in the seven years she's been coming to Kit Clark. "They're a lot of fun," she says. "They're always so nice."
Antwan is the first caller of the afternoon. He spins the cage holding the bingo balls. "I-19," he announces. "I-19." His turn over, he helps a gentleman who's parked his walker beside his chair.
Antwan lives with his mother and grandparents. His great-grandparents, who are in their late 80s, live nearby. "I see them every other day," Antwan says. "I play cards. I watch TV with them." Sometimes he shops for his elderly landlady.
"I already got experience with seniors," Antwan says. "When I get older, I'm going to want people to help me." - IRENE SEGE
Robin Graves
When Robin Graves moved to Massachusetts from Maine a dozen years ago, she heard about Urban Improv, an anti-violence program that, through drama and role-playing, helps city kids deal with challenges.Urban Improv also recruits mentors, and Graves was matched with an 8-year-old girl from Dorchester whose mother had recently died. Every week, the two met for a couple of hours: to do homework, take a walk, go for ice cream. Urban Improv is geared to young children, and the mentoring relationship usually ends after middle school.
But Robin Graves and Latasha Jackson, who will turn 18 this month, are still together. "I met her, and we fell in love, basically," is the way Graves, 63, puts it. "She's going to be part of my family forever. My kids and my husband love her." Jackson's father is a school bus mechanic, and she has a brother in the eighth grade, whom Graves has also taken under her wing.
"She's taught me everything moral," says Jackson, an honors student at Brighton High School. "When I started to hang out with her, I was going to museums and I couldn't wait until the next time I saw her so we could do something different. She's like family."
Homework comes first when they're together. But after that, it's play time. Graves taught Jackson how to ride a bike and, with her Jack Russell terriers, helped Jackson conquer her fear of dogs. Jackson visited Graves in the hospital after back surgery. Graves took Jackson to the Museum of Fine Arts; Jackson pushed the recovering Graves around in a wheelchair.
Over the years, they've seen most of Boston together: museums, concerts, sporting events, parks, restaurants. They've had cookouts and overnights at Graves's Dedham home. It was Graves who got Jackson a scholarship to the Park School summer camp, where she later became a counselor. For the past five years, they've participated in Kids Can Cook, an after-school program for city kids. Jackson was eventually hired by the organization. "She's in the kitchen now, and I'm her assistant," Graves says.
If Jackson's father can't make a parent-teacher conference, Graves goes. These days, the two are working on college applications and scholarships.
"She's up at 5 a.m. - she takes three buses just to get to school," Graves says. "I'm extremely proud of her, and I'm extremely proud of us, because there are no barriers." - BELLA ENGLISH
Leiha Macauley
Leiha Macauley works in a pressure-cooker profession - the law - so her cheerful demeanor around the office sometimes prompts questions like: "How can you be so happy in your seventh year of practice?"The answer may lie in the fact that her burgeoning law career is not Macauley's only source of satisfaction. At 31, the Day Pitney associate and Beacon Hill resident is awash in volunteer projects.
She launched the Child Health Advocacy Partnership, in which Day Pitney lawyers conduct weekly clinics in East Boston to provide legal assistance to poor families coping with housing and health issues.
She has raised $35,000 for the American Liver Foundation by running the Boston Marathon seven times, and teamed up with friends to raise twice that much by running five "date auctions." She has also raised money for the Big Sister Association of Greater Boston, where she sits on the board.
Macauley freely acknowledges that she first plunged into volunteering out of a sense of self-preservation. She was facing her first set of exams as a student at Boston University School of Law, and she got so worked up about it that she broke into a case of full-body hives. "I thought 'I really need something besides school,' " she recalls.
That "something" turned out to be SquashBusters, a program that teaches squash to disadvantaged youths. There Macauley met 11-year-old Lauren Thompson of Jamaica Plain, and became her mentor.
Thompson recalls how Macauley would drive to her home, brandish a map, and ask: "Where do you want to go?" But it went beyond day trips; Macauley also showed up at Thompson's house on weekends to help her study. As Thompson approached senior year in high school, feeling a bit intimidated by the college-application process, Macauley helped her navigate that maze, and wrote her a letter of recommendation.
Now, Thompson is a sophomore at Newbury College, but Macauley remains a guiding force in her life. "She helped me grow," says Thompson. - DON AUCOIN
Nayenday Thurman
Nayenday Thurman came up with the idea for her nonprofit organization Giving the Gift of Theatre (gift-of-theatre.org) soon after moving to Boston in 2000. A longtime fan of the theater, the 35-year-old Billerica resident immediately began attending plays at the Huntington. One that deeply affected her was Kia Corthron's "Breath, Boom," which explores the life of a young woman of color who wants to design fireworks but instead faces a cycle of jail and gang life. "If someone had given her an opportunity," says Thurman, the director of economic development programs at the Massachusetts Office of Business Development, "her life would have been different."Thurman long ago recognized the importance of following her dreams. As a child, she told her mother she wanted to try out for the lead role in the Broadway musical "Annie." The first black Annie wouldn't hit the boards until 1997, but Thurman's mother supportively took her child to the auditions. The experience, says Thurman, gave her the sense that "I can do anything." She left the Huntington knowing she wanted other young people to have the same confidence. Three years later she launched her organization, which helps middle-class students of color experience the theater. Her goal was to reach the students who don't have the economic opportunities of the rich or access to the cultural aid programs offered to the poor.
In 2004, after receiving $2,600 in donations, Thurman held the first event, sending 15 students in the Boston YMCA's afterschool program to see "Othello" at the Majestic Theatre. So far almost 100 elementary, middle, and high school students have participated. As part of the program, students write about their theater visit. An aspiring actress named Brittanye, who in 2005 saw "Abyssinia" at the North Shore Music Theatre with a group of young people from Calvary Baptist Church in Haverhill, wrote: "This piece inspired [and inspires] me to go forth and pursue my hopes and goals in the future." - VANESSA E. JONES
Carmen Barrientos
In the South End's Villa Victoria development, her neighbors call her "grandma."Maybe that's because Carmen Barrientos has 16 grandchildren and six great-grandchildren. Or maybe it's because she looks after her community with dedication and love.
When the idea came up to renovate Villa Victoria's main square, Plaza Betances, Barrientos served as a liaison among residents, city officials, and developers. When space opened up in the development's offices last year, Barrientos collected signatures and lobbied for a community room. She succeeded: Neighbors young and old gather in the room to play bingo, do arts and crafts, and chat.
"She's a true, respected, and natural community leader," says Vanessa Calderon-Rosado, chief executive officer of Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción (Puerto Rican Tenants in Action), a nonprofit agency that oversees the South End housing development's 800 units and arts center.
At a recent groundbreaking for the new plaza, Calderon-Rosado invited Barrientos to speak alongside Mayor Thomas Menino. Using her skills in English and Spanish, she commanded the audience, speaking about the importance of a renovated plaza, which serves as the centerpiece of the Spanish-styled community and a source of Puerto Rican pride.
Born in Dorado, Puerto Rico, Barrientos moved to Framingham at age 12. Her family eventually moved to Boston, and she moved to Villa Victoria in 1981. A seamstress, she quit her job in 1990 because of chronic eye problems and went on disability. "I got depressed. I didn't know what to do from 9 to 5," she says. "My doctor recommended I become involved in something."
She didn't look far. She began volunteering in her community. In 2003, the regular sound of gunfire at Villa Victoria and the increase in violence there began to concern her. She organized an interfaith service - what she calls "a peace prayer" - with churches to bring her neighbors together.
"When you do things as a volunteer, you are doing it from your heart," she says, patting her chest. "There is nothing we cannot do if we put our minds to it. I don't give up. I love my community." - JOHNNY DIAZ
Dana Story
Lacrosse is more commonly associated with suburban towns and elite prep schools than urban neighborhoods. MetroLacrosse, a youth sports program serving 500 boys and girls in eight Greater Boston communities, is striving to change that perception. Thanks to volunteers like Dana Story, it's also teaching a lot more than stickhandling skills. Young athletes are taught to apply concepts like effort and teamwork to their home and school environments as well, thereby improving their shot at life success.Story, 33, a senior tax manager with Deloitte in Boston, played lacrosse at Needham's St. Sebastian's School and Bentley College. He heard about MetroLacrosse through an ex-Bentley teammate and will soon be coaching a Mattapan/Hyde Park middle-school boys team for the fourth consecutive year. While involved with the program year-round, Story is busiest during the spring, when coaches must devote at least 10 hours a week to practice sessions and games.
"Once kids get exposed to the sport, they get hooked," Story says. Concerned at first about the heavy time commitment, Story adds that his firm has been supportive of his volunteer work. Fortunately, the April 15 tax deadline passes just as the spring lacrosse season shifts into high gear.
MetroLacrosse fields 30 teams on three grade levels - 5-6, 7-8, and 9-12 - and follows the RESPECT model (Responsibility, Effort, Sportsmanship, Participation, Enthusiasm, Communication, Teamwork) of character education. At each practice, coaches pick one concept and encourage players to apply it - for example, by backing up their teammates on defense. During games, referees grade players and teams on these core values. Proper nutrition, punctuality, and bringing along the proper equipment, and working through conflicts both on and off the field are habits emphasized throughout all levels of the program.
Story got his first taste of volunteerism through his high school's community service program. "Lacrosse has given me most of the rewards in my life," he reflects, "from developing a sense of teamwork to the personal friends I've made. This is my way of giving something back to a game I love. And even more, to a community." - JOSEPH P. KAHN
