2020-2021 Field Ambassador Project Summaries
Jennifer Chang
Coming soon!
Hamid Torabzadeh
The American Red Cross Los Angeles Region READYteens Program is a region-wide initiative designed for Youth and Young Adults, with a mission of educating high school and college students in the areas of disaster preparedness, response, and recovery. Youth have the opportunity to gain extensive, real-world experience to become leaders in community preparedness, safety and public health. After becoming Field Ambassador, Hamid wanted to do more with READYteens, and truly incorporate meaningful disaster preparedness work into the LA Youth Program. Since taking on this project alongside Youth Advisor and NYC Advisor Anna Giang, AmeriCorps Youth Coordinator Matthew Martinez, and his fellow youth volunteers, he has expanded the program into four main components.
The READYteens Program facilitates three main training programs including the Summer Program, Bootcamp, and Club Academy, which is currently in development, providing opportunities for Red Cross Youth Volunteers to lead presentations and community work, engage with READYteens content and curriculum, and prepare their own communities. In fact, Hamid is expecting around 150 participants for his virtual summer program which will be held from July 1 – July 29 in Summer 2021. The READYteens Program also now coordinates the LA Region Disaster Preparedness Workforce, which consists of Disaster Preparedness Officers (DPOs), E-Board Officers, and other Youth Volunteers around the region. The workforce engages with leading the READYteens training programs, Homes Made Safer Campaign (Sound the Alarm), and related community engagement. READYteens is committed to providing youth volunteers the opportunity to gain leadership experience, enhance their personal and professional expertise, and be actively involved and productive in serving as volunteers for the Red Cross – Hamid says that “it has been [his] honor to expand this outstanding program regionwide.”
To learn more, please visit the READYteens program home page for the LA Region.
Larry Huang
With the COVID-19 pandemic, it has been difficult to communicate and connect with others, so Larry wanted to put together a virtual LDC with the help of the SWWA Youth Council in order to bring everyone together across the entire Cascades and not just SW Washington. Larry helped conduct service activities during this LDC like putting together the region’s first-ever regional MAPathon or holding a disaster relief care-kit drive where participants can drop off materials at their school while social distancing. This benefited the region as it not only taught valuable leadership skills like public speaking, but also skills regarding disaster preparedness. This event also further introduced the different service branches of the American Red Cross and allowed volunteers to be more involved in IHL YAC since it was determined that the International Services branch was among the weaker points of the region. This event also allowed for more connection and networking opportunities due to how the team drew out the event over a few days with group chats and team building activities to further inforce friendships and opportunities for further collaboration.
Jessica Lin
Jessica is the Field Ambassador from the Texas Gulf Coast Region and her project was planning a Youth Recognition Ceremony. During their annual Leadership Development Conference in June, she will recognize the youth for their hard work throughout the year and give them a tier to show off. Additionally, the event will feature a video from other volunteers and employees showing their appreciation toward the youth for their dedication to the Red Cross.
Carolyn Lin
Carolyn is the Field Ambassador for the Southern California Region! Throughout this fiscal year, she has worked with her region to develop a regional initiative called Clubs Consortium Calls (CCCs). These are quarterly calls open to all Red Cross Club members on Zoom. Members join to hear about national initiatives, regional updates, and engage in discussion with Clubs across the region! She hosted the calls 3 times this year, for an hour each time. Initiatives and updates discussed in each meeting, including but not limited to:
IHL Campaign, NYIM, Blood Services Volunteering, Graduation Cords, Navin Narayan Scholarship, Logging Hours/Demographic Information, Black History Month, Youth Diversity Pledge, Navin Narayan College Scholarship, FEMA National Youth Preparedness Council, MIRCM History & Activities, 18+ Volunteer Opportunities, National Volunteer Week events, World Immunization Week, Vaccinate a Village fundraising campaigns, and Sound the Alarm activities! These virtual calls were extraordinarily successful, gaining over 215+ members! She’s looking forward to seeing how these calls will progress in the future!
Allyson Kang
Allyson is the Field Ambassador for the Gold Country Region. This past year, she has set up her region’s Youth Advisory Council and led the projects they have been working on. Gold Country’s youth engagement leaders strived to set up a long term support and engagement system for youth in their region. To do this, Allyson created a welcome call program with scripts for volunteers and set up an outreach system for our region’s high schools. Additionally, she planned a region-wide missing mapathon and the region’s first virtual Leadership Development Camp utilizing advice from many volunteers across the nation. Allyson is excited to see what her region can accomplish in the coming years!
Nikhil Reuben
For his Field Ambassador project, Nikhil created a section in the Nebraska-Iowa regional newsletter for youth and Clubs in my region. In the youth section of the newsletter, he posted volunteer/engagement opportunities for youth volunteers throughout the region, such as upcoming blood drives, Club events, virtual activities, national youth initiatives, or specific requests/messages from Clubs or volunteers within the region. He also posted youth spotlights to highlight the efforts of volunteers or Clubs within his region; the newsletter was somewhat similar to the YouthWire newsletter, but more specific to the Nebraska-Iowa region. The purpose of establishing a youth section of the Nebraska-Iowa newsletter was to help youth volunteers and Clubs throughout the Nebraska-Iowa region become more connected and engaged with Red Cross youth activities and initiatives. The newsletter would provide youth in his region with easy access to all regional youth updates and upcoming youth engagement opportunities. To make this newsletter accessible to youth throughout the region, Nikhil shared it through the youth volunteer group in Volunteer Connection by emailing it to the volunteers, as well as posting it in the group using the Groupshare features on Volunteer Connection. Nikhil’s goal for his youth newsletter was to help youth volunteers and Clubs throughout the Nebraska-Iowa region become more connected, as they would be able to easily see all of the regional youth updates, and would be able to use the newsletter to communicate more easily with other volunteers and Club leaders throughout the region. By accessing the newsletter through Volunteer Connection, this project was also implemented to help youth volunteers use Volunteer Connection more actively and explore more volunteering opportunities on Volunteer Connection.
Justin Chan
As a Field Ambassador, Justin strived to connect passionate Red Cross youth volunteers in the Central and Southern Ohio region to implement more volunteer opportunities and activities. By working with his region, Justin helped lead multiple Youth Council Projects. The Youth Council conducted a food drive competition between the Red Cross Clubs in the region and collected over 200 food items for a local food bank. The Youth Council also started the first ever newsletter in the region. The first edition highlighted all accomplishments from all the Red Cross Clubs throughout the school year. To successfully reach his goals, Justin took inspiration from previous Field Ambassadors and observed the existing youth councils in other regions. Justin’s project provided an opportunity for youth volunteers in his region to be a part of a passionate group of Red Cross volunteers. The Central and Southern Ohio Youth Council hopes to do more projects over the summer and into next school year.
Katherine Li
Katherine’s project focused on getting the high school Red Cross Clubs in her region more connected with each other! She knows this virtual year has made running Red Cross Clubs different and difficult to handle, so she thought being able to connect with local Red Cross Clubs gives Club leaders another resource they can reach out to for any questions or ideas.
She worked with her Youth Engagement Lead, Aparna Kachoria, to create a “Networking Guide” that offered advice and information on how to utilize Red Cross contacts (information on zoom meeting topics, how to maintain contact with each other, how to collaborate with each other, etc). All high school Red Cross Clubs in MA were grouped into small areas depending on their location and an email was sent out to each of these subgroups with information on their nearby Clubs and the Networking Guide attached. This project gave her a lot more insight on how widespread the Red Cross is in my state and allowed her to get more familiar with the Clubs in her area!
Hansika Gaddamanugu
Hansika’s goal in her project was to create more collaboration between all of the schools in the Central Florida region, and discuss events they could do collaboratively. Initially the plan was to host a seminar, however due to the chaotic nature of COVID-19 and exam schedules, it ended up being an emailed powerpoint that served more as a tool. By distributing the presentation via email, club leaders have been provided with a new helpful resource that they can continue to access and were able to direct any questions regarding it towards Hansika. Hansika found it very interesting to look into actions other regions have taken to work together within a virtual setting as her region is newer. Further, Hansika took advantage of the resources and connections facilitated by the National Youth Council. She believes that this project opened not only her eyes but her entire region’s eyes on the many things we can do to be more connected!
Sujay Rao
Sujay is the Field Ambassador from the Georgia Region for 2020-2021. This year, they held their region’s first region-wide Missing Maps campaign. This campaign aimed to increase awareness of the Missing Maps project in Georgia and to expand online volunteering on the platform. As Field Ambassador, he led the campaign which they called “Missing Maps Week ”, that took place at the beginning of April. The campaign was structured as a competition between Red Cross clubs around the state, with club members acting as teams to map the most buildings. Prizes were offered to the clubs who mapped the most. To drive the campaign, he hosted three region-wide Missing Maps Mapathons: one for club leaders to prepare them to host Mapathons at their own clubs, and two which were open to all volunteers in the region.
By the end of the campaign, several clubs had hosted their first ever Mapathons at their schools, and had even planned future events. Also, more volunteers in the region have learned of this incredible new way to volunteer and help communities around the world. In addition, through regionwide Mapathons, clubs made deeper connections with one another, promoting teamwork among youth volunteers in the region. Looking forward, they have provided activity guides for the “Missing Maps Week” campaign that can be used by future Field Ambassadors to ensure that this amazing event is an annual project that will continue to grow volunteering on Missing Maps in Georgia!
Gifti Aga
Coming soon!
Natasha Banga
The North Texas Region lacked a well-defined program for recognizing outstanding youth volunteers, something that Natasha sought to change by introducing a comprehensive Youth and Young Adult Recognition and Appreciation Program. This Program consists of several components including monthly volunteer spotlights, initiatives to log and recognize worked hours, an Annual Awards ceremony, and monthly birthday and anniversary recognition. A majority of the project goals were executed successfully. She says she truly enjoyed her experience in leading this initiative and gained a multitude of valuable skills. For example, she set up a Recognition and Appreciation Team within her Region to carry out anniversary birthday recognition calls and text messages, in addition to planning for the Youth and Young Adult Recognition Ceremony. This experience gave me an opportunity to apply my leadership skills and also communicate and interact with other dedicated, passionate youth volunteers across North Texas. She says she was truly grateful to have had the opportunity to serve in the position of Field Ambassador and implement this initiative.
Sanjana Vadrevu
Being the Field Ambassador of Michigan, Sanjana realized that her region needed motivation during these testing times. So, she came up with the idea of The Articles of Feat. There are many amazing active and involved volunteers that do incredible things for the Red Cross everyday but she would always love to see more involvement as it was starting to decline. So, she wanted to highlight the efforts made by volunteers by making articles that displayed the great efforts, achievements, and experiences of volunteers. This would allow such stories to be highlighted but also inspire others to do the same or even more. She also thought it would be important to recognize efforts made during difficult times. In the beginning it was difficult for her to gather people to join hands for this project but slowly they started trickling in. She remembers her first meeting having about 5 people but now they have 20 or more people regularly. She worked with many eager volunteers from different high schools and it was exciting for her to see where they were coming from and their stories.
Cecilia Wang
Within Cissy’s Field Ambassador term, she was able to immediately connect with youth volunteers in my region, and one of the most frequent questions that she received was how youth could get involved in the American Red Cross beyond their high school club experience. There are so many amazing youth volunteers in the National Capital & Greater Chesapeake Region who Cissy knew were ready to take initiative in pursuing new opportunities and positions within the organization so long as they had the resources and contacts to do so. From her interactions with these stellar volunteers, she was inspired to create a guide for volunteers to reference, including timelines, contacts, descriptions, recommendations, and other relevant information in opportunities such as the IHL YAC, Regional Youth Advisory Board, Blood Donor Ambassador, National Youth Council, and more. She compiled contact information and all the opportunities beyond Club that my region had to offer and reached out to a team of leaders in charge of town halls within the region’s chapters to set up dates to present and spread the word. She also hopes for her guide to support the region’s Executive Youth Advisory Board in creating more extensive guides in the years to come. She’s beyond excited to see how her Field Ambassador project will encourage NC&GCR youth volunteers to explore new ways to be involved and make impacts within the American Red Cross even after their high school Club experiences.
Arthi Venkatakrishnan
Witnessing the success of our statewide youth diversity pledge, Arthi thought to myself: why stop there? Hence, she coordinated with my regional contacts to further promote the Red Cross’s inspiring diversity and inclusion mission. Together, they developed the idea for “Speaking Red Cross,” an event that would celebrate the diversity of language skills within our volunteers and connect them with relevant opportunities in disaster recovery casework. They built upon the earlier themes of inclusion from the youth diversity pledge while fulfilling the needs for updated Volunteer Connection profiles as part of the “Tell Us More About You” initiative. Although seemingly minor, the information on a volunteer’s profile plays a major role in recruiting volunteers of certain skill sets and gauging demographics. Thanks to the joint efforts of our region and national resources, they were able to host the event at the end of April with 30+ participants. Just as they didn’t stop with the youth diversity pledge, they aren’t stopping; they plan to continue working on different parts of the Volunteer Connection profile and potentially expanding the “Speaking Red Cross” initiative nationwide.
Katherine Son
Coming soon!
Meghana Bhupati
As a youth of the Eastern NY Region, Meghana had no idea that they had Red Cross clubs until she became a Field Ambassador. In the past, she had volunteered as a CPC speaker separate from the club system. She thought that connecting these clubs and encouraging them to collaborate would strengthen our region’s youth presence and allow for exciting new ideas to sprout – so that’s what she did. She created monthly presidential summits for my region’s Red Cross clubs to receive regional and national updates, fundraising tips, event guides, and more! Over the past few months, clubs have hosted trainings, fire safety presentations, and bracelet fundraisers. Due to meeting with each other, many new projects have been planned such as Map-a-thons and field trips. They have a strong start for next school year and we can’t wait to see what they do next!
