Volunteers make a vital contribution to the work of the Christian Appalachian Project, adding newness and a breath of fresh air to programs that have been present in CAP counties for many years. In 2007, a volunteer who came to eastern Kentucky to participate in CAP’s Appalachian WorkFest, a spring break alternative program, began to think beyond her college years.
“WorkFest put some thoughts in my head,” said Kim Rice. “I began to realize how very planned my life was.”
A student at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Kim was completing her degree in English and secondary education. She was planning to attend graduate school, but her experience with construction projects made her thoughts take a different path. “At WorkFest, I started to think about and pray about where God was calling me.”
Kim completed and mailed the application that all WorkFest volunteers receive after returning home after their week of service and she received a call from volunteer director Kathy Kluesener inviting her to come to Kentucky for an interview. Finding money for a plane ticket was an obstacle, but Kim decided that overcoming that obstacle was a commitment she needed to make. The time she spent for the interview gave her additional information about CAP. For one thing, she learned that CAP does far more in Appalachia than the home repair project she saw as a WorkFest volunteer.
“I had never heard of CAP before WorkFest, and then we didn’t see that much,” Kim said. The application included a comprehensive list and description of programs and she saw several programs that would make good use of her recently earned degree. Kim expressed an interest in CAP’s family and child development programs, adult education and Camp Andrew Jackson, which hosts youth and teen programs in addition to summer camping.
After the interview and decision process, Kim began working as a teacher in the Family Life Child and Family Development Center in July 2008. Although her degree is in secondary education and she taught teens as a student teacher, Kim is enjoying working with pre-schoolers.
“My mom works with little kids and thought that I might change my mind, but no,” Kim said.
Although Kim plans to return to secondary education after completing her time as a vol-unteer, she has transferred skills in classroom management to her pre-kindergarten students. “There should always be a purpose to every action,” she said. “And kids need to do things that they can be proud of!”
As a WorkFest volunteer, Kim spent a week living in the Jackson House, the volunteer residence adjacent to Camp Andrew Jackson. As a long-term volunteer, she lives in a house on the grounds of the Family Life Center in Rockcastle County with 13 other volunteers.
“Living in a community is different than I expected,” Kim said. “And the Jackson House was different from the house I’m living in now.”
The major differences in the folks of her current house, are the wide variety in ages and stages of life. They are short-term and long-term volunteers, men and women, recent college graduates, as well as retired people. “We all take different things from each other. It’s a very tight-knit community of people who seem to genuinely care about one another,” Kim said.
Kim said she has been surprised at how well she has adapted to living so far away from Colorado. Although she left her family when she attended the University of Colorado, she was only 40 minutes away from home.
“I’m really quiet around people I don’t know, but I’ve been able to expand outside my comfort zone!”
Indeed, meeting new people and living in a community have become the things that Kim has enjoyed most about her volunteer experience. She describes the people in her community as those that she has come to rely on as she would family. “I’ve only known some of them for a month, but I’ve really made a genuine connection with them.”
Kim admits that although she is still a “planner” at heart, her time as a volunteer has allowed her to see her future with a bit more flexibility. She has been accepted into a graduate program at the University of Colorado that will enable her to continue with her education at the same time that she begins working as a teacher. She says she has always dreamed of teaching in an inner city school and will actively seek such a position.
“Although,” Kim says, “at CAP I’ve learned that poverty isn’t just in the inner city and it isn’t always something that you can easily see.”
