By Vanessa Chen, Staff Reporter
On a sunny afternoon in April, sophomore Noe Rowe and her friends led a park cleanup event in Fairmount Park as part of a community service project facilitated by the Live Like Blaine Leadership Academy.
Based in Philadelphia, the academy teaches sophomore female athletes to elevate their voices in their sport and community for a good cause. Rowe’s squash coach recommended she apply to the selective program last summer, and since September, she and the other girls in the program have been attending in-person workshops and speaker events in the Philadelphia area to enhance their leadership skills. As part of the program, students worked in teams throughout March to lead local community service projects. Rowe and her two teammates chose to focus their project on helping the local urban environment.
“I’m interested in sustainability and making sure the environment is clean, and I know that parts of Philadelphia are super dirty,” Rowe said. “The other two girls (and I) are really passionate about making the earth clean.”
On Wednesday, April 10, the sophomores hosted a trash cleanup at Fairmount Park outside of the Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia. They advertised the event on Instagram and organized necessary materials for the cleanup, ultimately leading a group of about 10 people to pick up trash for two and a half hours.
“It felt really good because we were able to see different parts of the area that we cleaned up” Rowe said. “We had collected this huge wire that was tangled in a tree, and that made such a difference just by looking at it. We were able to directly see our impact.”
The Live Like Blaine Leadership Academy ended in early April, and the sophomores have completed their community service projects. Rowe hopes to start a similar project in the future to continue her contribution to helping the environment.
“As a person, I’m more inspired to connect with girls more. I think connection can bring so much good,” Rowe said. “In terms of service projects, I’m much more inspired to go out and make a change because now I know it’s not just something you think of as ‘Oh, I should be doing this’ but something that you can actually go out and do.”
Vanessa Chen can be reached at [email protected].
