Movin’ on Up (To the West Side)

The past couple days have been a whirlwind of traveling. Thursday morning Rebekah, Emeline and I explored University Circle in search of pictures and interviews to include in our guidebook. We dropped by the Case Western Reserve University Admissions Office to chat with Molly Cronin about the role case plays in education, in Cleveland, and in Cleveland’s Hispanic population. While Molly rarely strayed from the typical Admission Counselor’s script, we were able to pull some interesting facts out of her, including that Case’s student population is only 16% “underrepresented minority,” which is composed of African American, Hispanic, and Native American students. Following our interview, we visited the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, where the staff was incredibly helpful, even letting us in to photograph the museum for free (as opposed to a $10 admission fee per person).

Following our visit to the CMNH, we rushed over to the west side to Esperanza, where we spent the day putting together over 150 goody bags for the Volunteer and Alumni Appreciation Ceremony on Thursday (which Emeline and I will be working). This involved putting together a bag with a nice mug, bumper sticker, and a membership card. Although it sounds simple, we had a bit of a challenge coordinating the numbers on the membership cards with their corresponding labels, since several of the cards were misplaced in the boxes they were delivered in, and someone *cough cough* (Rebekah) forgot to print several numbers when making the labels. Once we finished, Adria (the volunteer and alumni coordinator) came in and told us that she was so glad we were here, since she would be spending hours doing this without our help. I’d been having some doubts about how much we were really contributing, so hearing that we were so appreciated felt incredible. We finished up the day with Emeline and Rebekah working on contacting religious organizations for volunteers while I added the data from the past year (May-December 2013) into the Prezi I started on Wednesday.

            Today was a bit more boring, but seemed more impactful. This morning I was about to sit down to finish the Prezi by adding some photos of the volunteers, when one of the other employees borrowed me from Adria to help out with some filing. As it turned out, one of their other volunteers had been asked to alphabetize the files of their scholarship recipients, but had made quite a few mistakes. Some were understandable, such as filing a student with two last names by the first letter of the second last name, but some files were clearly just out of place. After I re-alphabetized the files, I was asked to sort media release forms into piles of students vs. volunteers, placing the student forms in their corresponding files. While this was quite a boring task, the women I was working for (whose name I cannot recall) was very grateful for the help. I then finished up the Prezi, and Emeline, Rebekah and I set off for the West Side Market. Here we took several photographs and grabbed some lunch. Emeline and I split a delicious cupcake from Grandma Campbell’s, while Rebekah enjoyed a hotdog. After touring the market for a while we each split off for our respective plans. The West Side Market was definitely a group favorite, and quite a delicious way to end the week.

Hot out of the Oven!

Catching the Bull by It's Horns

Chocolate Cheesecake Cupcake :)

Grandma Campbell's Cupcakes

Emeline's Raspberry Cheese Strudel

Inside

Fruit!

Down The Isle

In A Rush

Meat

Pastries

More Pastries

Crowds

Heading Inside

Rebekah's Hotdog

The Big Bite

Catch of the Day

Spices

Balcony View

Veggies!

More Veggies

Even More Veggies!

Vendor

Berries