SPEAKER_00
Thanks so much, Maureen.
So as Maureen said, I'm a Franklin grad, so hooray to all the Quakers in the room.
And I was a reading coach 11 years ago.
So being a freshman at Franklin High School there's some things I remember more vividly than other things but I distinctly remember how I felt and the impact that Team Reed had on me.
So 15 year old me was frustrated.
I was disappointed because I had been looking for a job and no one was willing to give me a job.
I was too young, I was inexperienced and I didn't have what it takes.
So luckily one of my friends told me about Team Read and she told me it was a program where I could combine one of my favorite pastimes which is reading with being able to make a positive impact on my community while also getting a paycheck.
And I was like well of course I'll sign up for Team Read.
So I signed up for Team Read and I was a tutor at Dearborn Park and at Brighton Elementary School.
And the 15-year-old me was most interested in getting a paycheck, right?
That was big to me, being able to go buy my own things.
But it wasn't really the paycheck that stuck with me.
It was actually all those other things that I learned through Team Read that are still with me today.
And the first is work ethic.
Talking a little bit about work ethic, all of my friends when I was 15 would stay outside of school after school.
You'd go to the store, you hung out.
I knew I had to be at Team Read for my reader.
So I would get on the 7 bus and go make sure I was at my elementary school Monday through Thursday after school and Friday was my day to hang out after school.
So I learned a lot of valuable lessons about work ethic.
And the second is mentorship.
When I first joined Team Read I thought I was just going to go there and work with the students on their reading but it was actually a lot more than that.
I realized the second and third graders were looking up to me.
They were looking to me to model how they should interact with people.
What is it like to be a high schooler?
What is it like to be a teenager?
How should I act?
And because I saw them looking at me for that, I started changing the way I behaved so I could set a good example for them.
So I learned quite a bit about mentorship.
And those are things that have stuck with me even after I left Team Read.
From the time I was 15, I had a job.
I worked through community college.
I went to Seattle Central Community College.
I worked through the University of Washington.
I graduated top of my class at Foster School of Business.
And I now work for Deloitte Consulting in the Strategy and Operations Group.
So it's amazing to be able to bring it full circle and be on the board of Team Reed.
And I'm super passionate about what we do and what we do for our tutors and the students.
But most importantly, the lessons that you get out of it that aren't surface level, right?
All those residual effects, they're real.
And I've experienced it and 16,000 alum in the city of Seattle have experienced it.
And I hope more people get the opportunity.
So I couldn't resist the opportunity today.