AARP Experience Corps tutors help Baltimore elementary students improve their reading skills.

With National Volunteer Week upon us, it’s a great time to recognize the significant contributions that volunteers make to society.  At AARP, we see the power of the volunteer firsthand – we work with millions of volunteers and engaged citizens who suit up every day to help people 50+ turn dreams into real possibilities, to strengthen communities and to fight for issues that matter to families.

For over 55 years, AARP has been tapping the brains of people who are willing to share their time and talents to improve the lives of people 50+ and their families.  Our volunteers help people save money on their taxes through the AARP Foundation’s Tax Aide program.  They save lives through AARP Driver Safety, the nation’s largest volunteer-run driver safety program.  They make their voices heard in Washington, DC and in state capitols across the country on issues like Medicare, Social Security, and home energy costs.  And they work closely with our AARP teams in all 50 states, Puerto Rico, the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands to protect people from scams and fraud and make communities better for people of all ages.  From our all-volunteer Board of Directors to our volunteer State Presidents to our advocacy activists, volunteers are at the heart of AARP and our social mission.

Related: Creative Ways to Thanks Those Who Serve — National Volunteer Week

And there are so many people who give back to the community in their own way, which has a tremendous impact – the Corporation for National & Community Service estimates that the economic value of volunteer contributions was $171 billion in 2011.  In fact, nearly three quarters of AARP’s 37 million members volunteer and provide their unpaid time, experience and skills to causes they believe in.  That is why we launched Create the Good, to help people find volunteer opportunities close to home.

The work that AARP does on behalf of people 50+ and their families simply could not be done without the powerful fuel and energy of our volunteers.  I hope you will join me today and every day in noticing the many ways our neighbors, family and friends give of themselves to make life just a bit better for all.  This week, we honor these folks and the work they do to make our world a better place.

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It’s amazing how one meeting, one interaction, one event can change our lives. This has been the case for me as I have ventured out to make my dream of becoming the first astronaut to Mars a reality. I may only be 15-years-old, but I have made connections that have already changed my life.  What I have learned is that people have so much power to help shape the destiny of others, simply by offering a helping hand. My own experiences have led me to setup an outreach program to inspire kids and adults everywhere to dream big. My inspiration to setup a program to inspire others came from my mentor, Italian Astronaut Luca Parmitano, here is what he has taught me:

Lesson 1: Listen and Connect

I met Luca by chance in the Orlando Airport, after the last launch of Endeavour was scrubbed. Luca was really interested in my goal to be the first astronaut to Mars and spent over an hour talking with me. This meeting ended with him giving me his email address and telling to email him anytime with questions. My mom nudged me and jokingly said, “Look Abby, you’ve got your very own astronaut!” and Luca turned around and said, “I would be honored to be your astronaut.” Hence a mentorship began.

When you meet someone who is passionate and whom you can inspire with your own successes, take time to listen to them. It’s amazing what a few minutes can do to boost someone else and encourage them. Not everyone can be your mentor or mentee, but showing interest in others and their pursuits is incredibly valuable. Inspiring others should be something we all strive to do daily.

Lesson 2: Dreams and Passions

The best advice that Luca has given was to do what I love and not try to fit some pre-conceived idea of what NASA is looking for in an astronaut. This has guided me in the courses I choose in school, and the path by which I will accomplish my dream of being an astronaut. Regardless of where my path leads me I know I will be happy because I am following a course of study that is interesting to me.

Inspiring kids and adults to follow their dreams and passions is a cornerstone of my #SoyuzAdventure Outreach Campaign. From Luca I have learned that average people do extraordinary things everyday and it’s important to inspire people to reach for the stars whatever their version of stars may be.

Lesson 3: Share Your Experiences and Inspire Others

Besides being passionate about space and science, Luca and I have a joint passion of inspiring kids to dream big.  It is through Luca’s own generosity of being my mentor that I have aspired to ignite passion for more kids in a bigger way than simply to blog about my experiences.

I knew, when I was invited by Luca to attend his Russian Soyuz launch on May 28, 2013, that sharing the experience was something I was compelled to do. Just as Luca had inspired me, it was now my job to do the same for as many other kids as possible. So I launched my #SoyuzAdventure Outreach Campaign with six months of classroom visits, web chats, writing and speaking that is designed to reach kids around the world and ignite passion about space, STEM and dreaming!

I hope to be able to share these lessons that Luca has taught me with many others. The smallest of gestures, a mere conversation, or something more, can change a life forever. Making connections to follow your dreams, and then using your passions to inspire others is an amazing thing. A mentor often asks for nothing in return, except an unspoken agreement that when the time comes, you will do your best to help someone else in the future. Imagine if every professional found one teenager or young adult to mentor and gave them the same gift that Luca has given to me. The results would be phenomenal! Who will you help today?

When not in the classroom or on the gymnastics mat, Abby can be found attending rocket launches around the world, visiting classrooms to share her experiences, speaking with world-renowned astronauts and scientists and penning articles for space-related magazines and websites. You can learn more about Astronaut Abby here. 

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En route to the Abuja, Nigeria airport. On our way home. It’s been a week of 10-hour days and the Rotarians are visibly tired.

They’ve trudged down countless alleys, endured smoke, dust storms, and long bumpy bus rides. But in spite of these inconveniences, no one would trade this week for anything - even a bike trip in Italy.

I asked Patrice Putnam if she’d come back. “I’d do it in a minute. With Rotary you pay your own trip, so for two of us it was fairly expensive to come over here. We went to Provence on our honeymoon and had a wonderful time. But THIS is life changing.” Her husband, Jerry Casey, is emotional. “I wish I had done something like this in my twenties, it may have been a life changing experience and maybe changed to direction that my life went in. But not having done that I’m very glad I’ve done it now.”

Al Bonney, the Rotarian who organized the Wheels of Hope wheelchair giveaway program, says he’s profoundly changed. “If there is to be definition of success for this trip for Al Bonney, it would be my personal growth and transformation as a result of what I’ve seen and what I’ve been able to do here. If you really want to know the number one takeaway is that I am a different guy, and my wife will see a different guy when I arrive home on the 21st than she kissed goodbye on the 7th of December.”

On this short trip, the Rotarians have had an impact – 4,000 more Nigerian children are immunized, and polio is a little closer to being wiped off the face of the earth. But I can’t help thinking that the impact of this trip goes in the other direction, too.  The team members have learned about polio and life in Nigeria, but most importantly, they’ve learned about themselves.

Photos by Philip Graitcer

Graitcer is an independent radio producer based in Georgia. His stories have been heard on NPR, The World, Studio 360, and VOA. This is his fourth career — he’s also been a medical epidemiologist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, a university professor, and a bicycle tour leader in Europe. His most recent radio stories can be heard on the website. You can follow him on Twitter at @radio_phil.

To learn how to volunteer for a Rotary polio trip, contact your local club or Rotary International.

For part 1 of the series, click here. Part 2 here. Part 3 here. Part 4 here. 

Today is one of Nigeria’s Polio Plus Days. These are days when there’s a big push to go out and bring polio immunizations to the people. We’re going to the Monday Market — one of the largest outdoor markets in this part of Nigeria. Everyone comes here to get their supplies — from fruits, vegetables and meats, to clothing, building supplies and car parts. There will be thousands of people and hundreds of kids.

Our team had a new addition — a town crier. She’s Miriam Dima, about 4’8” tall, dressed in a African print wrap, a green shawl and a light blue apron with “Immunization Is Safe and Effective” printed on it. She’s carrying a battery-powered megaphone. As we walk through the market, she speaks in the local Hausa language — her amplified voice carrying across the market.

“Good morning, good morning. Come closer for immunization. How many children have not been vaccinated? Bring them close. Immunization prevents sickness. Children are the future of tomorrow. May God bless us.”

As we snake through the crowds, we’re on the lookout for infants in their mothers’ arms or strapped to their mothers’ backs. They might be eligible for a polio immunization. We look for an ink mark on the fingernail of the child’s left hand pinky, a sign that the child was immunized. If there isn’t a mark, the child is unvaccinated.

The market was so crowded we could hardly walk, but remarkably, there was little pushing or shoving. The crowds just part — like Moses and the Red Sea — as we walked through. In a couple hours we gave 400 immunizations.

Photos by Philip Graitcer

Graitcer is an independent radio producer based in Georgia. His stories have been heard on NPR, The World, Studio 360, and VOA. This is his fourth career — he’s also been a medical epidemiologist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, a university professor, and a bicycle tour leader in Europe. His most recent radio stories can be heard on the website. You can follow him on Twitter at @radio_phil.

To learn how to volunteer for a Rotary polio trip, contact your local club or Rotary International.

For part 1 of the series, click here. Part 2 here. Part 3 here. Check back for the final part of this series next Wednesday.

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After a day of practice, everyone’s ready to get going. We’re prepared, and we’re dressed for long, hot days in the sun. One team member, Al Bonney, 63, from Traverse City, Michigan, particularly stands out. He looks like a fisherman without any water to fish in. He’s wearing a fishing vest, a fishing hat, khaki cargo pants and boots. On his back is a Camelback water pouch. His got a lot in his vest pockets, too.

“Patrice Putnam, Bob Stuart, Al Bonney”

“I’ve got all kinds of stuff. I’ve got a magic marker that I’m supposed to use to mark the fingers of the kids we vaccinate. I’ve got the scissors that we’re supposed to use to open the vials of vaccine. I’ve got my camera. I’ve got hand sanitizer. I’ve got mosquito repellant and sunscreen. I’ve got toilet paper, a pen and paper, and a notebook.” And he’s brought along lunch and a couple of power bars, too. We’re divided up into smaller teams — three American Rotarians, a Rotarian from a Nigerian club, plus three local health department workers — and head out into the neighborhoods of north Kaduna.

My group is going to the Fulani Road neighborhood, a poor Muslim area in north Kaduna. Fulani Road is a small, lined with shops and one-story houses. We leave the street and head down an alley about 2 feet wide. Mud walls of houses line each side, a trench — filled with sewage — is in the middle. Smells of rotting stuff permeate the air and cooking fires make my eyes water and cause me to cough and sneeze. Because this is a Muslim community, men can’t go in the compounds, but I can tell from the outside they are poor. On one, the corrugated tin metal door falls off the frame as the vaccinators open it. There are a few dogs and chickens running around. We wind around the alleys until we get to another paved street, or it may be the same one — it seems like we’re walking in circles.

“Off the street, vaccinating in the neighborhood.”

As we move from house to house, following a pre-determined plan, one of the Rotarians gives the polio drops while another marks on the walls in chalk the date we visited the house, our team number, the number of kids in the house and the number we vaccinated today. Last, we draw an arrow to show the direction we are heading next. I’m paired with Mary Stitt and Ken Hughes. He’s from a Rotary club in Burlington, Kansas. He’s retired now, but use to work in a nuclear plant. He’s a little overwhelmed by the sights and smells. “I’m seeing things for the first time. The people here have been so friendly. I just love the children. This is something I never expected to be a part of.”

Hughes is excited to be part of a worldwide effort to get rid of polio. As he bends over a child and gives two drops of the polio vaccine, he tells me, “I just had to do this. This is what I want to be doing. I may never get a chance to do this again. Polio eradication is a huge effort, and I just wanted to be a little part of it, just to say, when polio is gone, I did something to help.” On the first day in the field, the Rotarian teams give over 1,200 polio immunizations.

Photos by Philip Graitcer

Graitcer is an independent radio producer based in Georgia. His stories have been heard on NPR, The World, Studio 360, and VOA. This is his fourth career — he’s also been a medical epidemiologist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, a university professor, and a bicycle tour leader in Europe. His most recent radio stories can be heard on the website. You can follow him on Twitter at @radio_phil. 

To learn how to volunteer for a Rotary polio trip, contact your local club or Rotary International.

For part 1 of the series, click here. Part 2 here. Check back for Part 4 of this series next Wednesday. 

Fomwan Maternity Hospital, Kaduna

For most of the team, this is a new experience. They’ve never been in a developing country or given polio immunizations. Now, on our second day in Kaduna, they’re getting their sea legs — learning how to give polio immunizations in a maternity clinic, where 40 crying infants, held by their mothers, are waiting.

AnnLee Hussey, (left), a veteran of more than 20 polio teams and the team leader, tells the group how to do it. “Make sure you don’t touch the child’s lip or tongue, tip it up, you can’t administer vaccine like this…” The Rotarians watch nervously and take notes. Finally it’s their turn. First up is Patrice. She leans over an infant, and as the baby opens her mouth, Putnam squeezes the dropper. Bull’s-eye! “I got both drops in the mouth. Saving one baby at a time.”

She’s all smiles but says giving the vaccine was harder than she anticipated, “making sure it was going in the mouth, at the same time, you’re trying to squeeze, at the same time you’re shaking with excitement.” Team member Mary Stitt is an old hand at polio  immunizations.

Stitt (right) is 87 and a retired elementary school principal from Chicago. This is her fifth Rotary trip to Nigeria. She’s also been on Rotary trips to India and Upper Volta. Although she’ll miss her great-grandson’s madrigal recital while she’s away on this trip; she doesn’t see that as a sacrifice. “It’s nice to do a variety of things. It’s just living out my life the way I feel it ought to be lived.” With a slight stoop, her wide brim hat, and white hair, Stitt attracts a lot of attention as she goes door to door immunizing.

In Nigeria, it’s unusual to see someone so old out and about, and the Nigerians are impressed. They smile and call her grandma. She says that makes her feel really good, “The people here revere older people. That’s very reassuring. It’s lovely. It’s a very needy country. They’re very grateful. I think we like that as Americans. We don’t see that very often.” Seven years ago, Mary celebrated her 80th birthday on a polio trip. She’s thinking about celebrating her 90th birthday on another trip.

Graitcer is an independent radio producer based in Georgia. His stories have been heard on NPR, The World, Studio 360, and VOA. This is his fourth career — he’s also been a medical epidemiologist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, a university professor, and a bicycle tour leader in Europe. His most recent radio stories can be heard on the website. You can follow him on Twitter at @radio_phil. 

To learn how to volunteer for a Rotary polio trip, contact your local club or Rotary International.

For part 1 of the series, click here. Check back for Part 3 of this series next Wednesday. 

 Photos by Philip Graitcer

This is a guest post by Philip L. Graitcer and the first in a five-part series about a group of dedicated Rotary volunteers helping to eradicate polio in Kaduna, Nigeria.  

On the volunteer team is Patrice Putnam, a 59-year old lawyer from Winthrop, Maine. She’d never been to Africa. She and her husband, Jerry, were saving to go to Italy to ride bikes and drink wine when they learned about the Rotary trip to Nigeria. She had another idea. “I just wanted to do something that might just change the world a little bit, so we took what we had saved and put it into this trip instead.”

She told me it would be something to tell her grandchildren, and besides, “I wanted to be able to say, ‘there used to be a terrible disease and we were part of ending it.’ ”

Deborah Salim, 62, had been living a quiet life in her mother’s home town of Conway, S.C., happy with her 15-year job in the record keeping office of the local community college and with the fact that four of her five children and their children were close by.

Then came 2009, and for Deborah, like so many other 50-plus, the bottom dropped out of her world. She received a week’s notice from the college that budget cuts had eliminated her position. Her mother died.  She had a pacemaker put in.

She also graduated from online Everglades University in May 2009, with a B.S. degree in alternative medicine and $30,000 worth of student loans.

“At first, I was in total shock about losing my job.  I was hopeful about finding another one, but I still applied for unemployment insurance the last day of work,” Deborah says.

For the next year, Deborah looked for a job.  “I must have sent out a thousand online applications,” she says, “but I never got one response.  I finally began passing out my resume at every doctor’s office in the area, but that didn’t work either – once people found out I was close to retirement age, they didn’t want to talk anymore.”

South Carolina law requires unemployed people to report to their local unemployment office every week on their job-search progress.  “It’s always crowded, with lines into and around the building,” said Deborah. Her eyes were drawn to a small poster on the wall, headed “Over 55 and Out of Work?  SCSEP Can Help.”

Not only was she 55-plus, but Deborah met the other two qualifications:  She was unemployed and her income was 125% or less of the federal poverty level.  “When you’re unemployed, you have to be a seeker as well as an observer,” she says. She called up the people at the Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP) and made an appointment.

SCSEP helped Deborah find a training position as a grant writer for the local United Way; she has been there for 18 months now.  Because of state budget cuts, she now works 18 instead of 30 hours a week.

Once she began working at the United Way, Deborah’s biggest challenge became her home mortgage, which was $624 a month.  Her mortgage holder, Chase Bank, referred her to the National Association of Community Agencies for counseling.  It wasn’t easy and at one point she even had to offer it up as a short sale.  In the end, NACA was able to renegotiate her mortgage payment from $624 to $477 a month.  Deborah also became eligible for Social Security widows’ benefits.

Today, three and a half years after her financial ordeal began, Deb credits her unswerving faith with making it possible to get through it.  “I was very afraid sometimes,” she says.

“But I always remembered what Dr. Martin Luther King said:  Faith is taking the first step, even when you can’t see the staircase.”

Deborah Salim’s story is part of the documentary “Set for Life,” created by filmmakers Susan M. Sipprelle and Samuel D. Newman. The film has won best documentary at both the Massachusetts Independent Film Festival and the New Jersey Film Festivals. 

Photo by Becky Squires

Four-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Jeff Gordon packs meals Friday at Daytona International Speedway.

What happens behind the scenes at a NASCAR race is just as important as what takes place on the track, and that was the case for four-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Jeff Gordon and the Drive to End Hunger #24 Chevrolet at this year’s Daytona 500, a history-making edition of NASCAR‘s biggest race.

Jeff started second, behind Danica Patrick, the first woman not only to earn the coveted pole position but also to lead a lap at Daytona and to finish in the top 10 (she was 8th). But by the middle of that first lap, Jeff was in the lead and stayed there for the next 30 times around.

Unfortunately for the Drive to End Hunger team, it wasn’t to last. Five laps short of making history himself by becoming the all-time leader in first-place laps at Daytona, Jeff fell back; radio conversations with crew chief Alan Gustafson indicated that problems with water temperature and pressure were hurting the car’s performance. The amazing #24 pit crew got things worked out, and Jeff started moving up the ranks again toward the end, as high as fifth. He certainly looked to be a factor in the finish, which turned out to be gripping, but a fiery crash in the last lap that Jeff got caught up in held him to 20th. It really was a heck of a race, with a barn-burner ending, and may just have won NASCAR new fans who had only idled by to see what all this Danica Panica was about.

Despite the consolation that Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jimmie Johnson won the race, there was definite disappointment in the #24 garage after. But further behind the scenes, folks were celebrating a much better finish for the Drive to End Hunger team. Over the weekend, Drive to End Hunger volunteers packed more than 38,000 meals for the Second Harvest of Central Florida food bank. And once again, as in the last two years, the International Speedway Corporation, owner of the Daytona International Speedway and almost all of the other leading tracks on the NASCAR circuit, helped out with donations of extra food through their concessionary wing, Americrown.

Jeff Gordon with volunteers from the Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida.

The partnership with ISC – the teamwork with them and with other sponsors – is the secret behind Drive to End Hunger’s ongoing successes. “Millions of older Americans are forced to make impossible decisions about whether they can afford to eat, see a doctor, or stay in their home,” said Jo Ann Jenkins, AARP Foundation president. “We are so proud to be working with ISC and Americrown to help make those choices a little easier in communities across the country.”

No one likes to waste food. Drive to End Hunger and ISC have found a way to turn that potential waste into a bonanza. It’s a win-win at the checkered tablecloth.

And the numbers really are adding up. Since its inception, Drive to End Hunger has generated 16 million meal donations; $14.9 million has been raised through corporate partnerships and donations from everyday folk; and Drive to End Hunger food drives at 46 food banks across the country have raised another $1.76 million.

People see the passion in Jeff’s eyes about winning, and they see that it applies not just out there on the track, but back there in the soup kitchens and church basements and community centers and parking lots lined with folding tables for assembly-line packing of grocery bags and meal parcels. It’s about winning the fight against food insecurity, and winning it with teamwork.

Both Jeff and  Jenkins were part of the team packing grocery bags before the big race this weekend. The partnership they’ve formed will carry the good work forward to the next race and the next Drive to End Hunger event, fueled by that unfading passion to keep winning. You just might want to come along for the ride.

Help leave older adult hunger in the dust with a donation to Drive To End Hunger. You can also make a difference by volunteering at a local food bank. For other volunteer opportunities, please visit Create The Good. 

Photos by Brian Berry 

Not only could I not believe that my mother said YOLO, short for you only live once, but that she and Dad (who put off back surgery for a week) were trekking it to New Orleans, on a bus for nearly 15 hours nonetheless – to cheer on the Baltimore Ravens in the 47th Superbowl. (As I type this, they are 11 hours into their trip and probably somewhere in Tennessee).

“This may be our only chance to go,” Mom confirmed. The statement felt like a slap in my face. They’re in their mid 60s, celebrating 45 years of marriage this year. And while 65 isn’t old, she has a point: “When opportunities like this come your way,” she said, “you don’t pass them up.”

I guess she’s right. The last time Baltimore was in the “Big Show” was 12 years ago and they were in their early 50′s. Who knows when the next time will be? Or even if it will happen.

Mom and Dad

I’m proud of my folks. They usually aren’t as spontaneous at this, but they’re devoted fans and I appreciate that they recognize the monumental opportunity.

To tell you the truth, it’s incredibly inspiring. I’ll admit that I’m not one to drop things, reschedule plans or throw down some dough just for an experience, but isn’t that what life’s about? Experiencing moments that make remarkable memories?

My parents are going to have an amazing story to tell to when they get back and I can’t wait to hear it and see the photos.

So, this makes me wonder….when is the last time you were spontaneous? How did it turn out for you? Good? Was it a memory you’ll always cherish?

And one last important question: Ravens or 49ers? (I think you know who I’m rooting for!)

Jen will update her parents status via her Twitter account at: @iheartrocknroll