Archive

When refugees and those seeking asylum come to this country, they often are bombarded with challenges: adapting to a new language and culture, feelings of isolation, and dealing with the trauma of leaving their homes in the first place. Amy Tenney wants to use her OSI-Baltimore Community Fellowship to help those refugees and asylees in […]

Shantell Roberts can remember the exact time her mother called her at work to say that she’d found Roberts’ 1-year-old daughter unresponsive in the bed. It was 9:48 a.m. – and the moment everything in her life changed. Tylour Marie had been sick with a fever and vomiting, but doctors didn’t seem too worried, telling […]

Kim Loper was working as an Americorps Fellow at Jubilee Arts after the Baltimore Uprising, following the death of Freddie Gray, happened. In the aftermath, many organizations rightly became keenly interested in better engaging the city’s young people, giving them voice and tapping into their creative spirits. Loper, who earned her MFA in Community Arts […]

Alex Long remembers seeing the change happen in his 8-year-old son’s best friend. It was hard to watch, unfurling suddenly after the boy witnessed his older brother being “gunned down” in the street. “He was angry; he would snap on his grandmother. He was getting suspended at school. His grades changed,” Long says. “One day, […]

Munib Lohrasbi, 25, first developed a passion helping people with disabilities while volunteering with Best Buddies, a nonprofit that works to create opportunities for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, in high school. In college, he continued this work by volunteering with Goodwill and advocating for disability rights. While he loved working with people directly, […]

From a young age, Eric Jackson knew social work was his life’s work. “My grandma was the first ‘social worker’ in my life,” Jackson says. “She helped the community no matter what that meant. And she encouraged me to always do the same. It just stuck.” Jackson is a life-long resident of Cherry Hill, one […]

Except for a few years of college, Ryan Flanigan has lived in Baltimore his whole life. After deciding college was not for him, he returned to the city and worked for an upholsterer for over 10 years, at a shop located in the central Baltimore neighborhood of Remington. He moved to Remington about six years […]

As a life-long resident of Sandtown-Winchester, Ausar Daniels often found that the social, economic and political conditions surrounding his neighborhood weren’t conducive to healthy living. Sandtown-Winchester – thrust into the spotlight after Freddie Gray’s death – has long been home to the worst living conditions in Baltimore. And as one of the many food deserts […]

On the surface, food insecurity and food waste seem to be antithetical to each other. But after becoming a regular volunteer at the Baltimore Free Farm, Matthew Burke learned how both issues intersect and are plaguing Baltimore city. “There’s a lot of people in our communities who are forced to buy overpriced, unhealthy, processed foods […]

Jackie Bello has always known that she wanted to be a teacher. She is the daughter of two public school teachers, and her brother teaches as well. After graduating from college, she applied for Teach for America and asked to be placed in Baltimore City. She loved her time teaching at Northwestern High School, where […]