Booz Allen transforms our Programs Office!

Thanks to Booz Allen's volunteers, AALEAD was able to have one more room transformed in our community center! On a very hot Saturday August 1, volunteers came to paint, break down desks, and build new desks!

BEFORE: A drab white room with mismatched desks...



Volunteers started by taping the trim and hauling out the old furniture.


Then the painting began! The room started looking a little more pistachio green with a brown trim.


Meanwhile, other volunteers built desks downstairs.



Waiting for the paint to dry, we stopped for a lunch break and a photo.


AFTER: the desks were ready to be brought upstairs to a freshly painted room!



Success! Thank you Booz Allen volunteers for a room transformed!

AAPI Day of Service

On Saturday, May 30th a group of volunteers arrived---ready to assist AALEAD in beautifying our building.

What was once a boring and drab white office room....

...was worked on and painted on for hours by our hard working volunteers. Taping edges was involved, using rollers to get the walls, painting the trim, covering the floor with plastic... and even moving furniture out of the way. Soon the room became an inviting warm orange!

With so many volunteers in attendance, they even painted our hallway a nice bright yellow!

THANK YOU VOLUNTEERS!

If you are interested in having a group volunteer with us, please email klee@aalead.org

Service Day at AALEAD!

http://www.aapimomentum.org/events/2009/05/may-30-dc-day-service-asian-american-lead

(May 30, DC) Day of Service @ Asian American LEAD

Asian American LEAD is in the midst of beautifying our community youth center. For our service event, we will assemble new furniture and paint one of our rooms.

AALEAD's overarching goal is to increase the opportunities and ability of low-income Asian American children to move out of poverty and become successful, self-sufficient adults.

Date: Sat, May 30

Time: 10am - 3pm

Dress code: Clothes that you don’t mind getting paint on!

Limited spots available. Please RSVP by emailing Lan atlthomas@aalead.org

Event Image: 

Event Type: 

Day of Service - Community Center Renovations - Painting/Building

Date: 

Sat, 05/30/2009 10:00am – 3:00pm

Location: 

AA LEAD Community Center

1323 Girard Street, NW

Washington, DC, 20009

United States

First Annual LOTUS FESTIVAL!

On Saturday, May 16th, AALEAD hosted its first Lotus Festival!

The idea for the event and the name for the event came from the AALEAD Ambassadors. Our Ambassadors are a select group of high school youth who met once a month to figure out ways to promote AALEAD and share about what we do. They decided that an event like the "Lotus Festival" would be a great way to show others about our programs! And it was!

The event was held at our Center in Columbia Heights from 1:00-3:30pm.

Inside, there were a host of games, arts & crafts, programs posters, slideshows, and FOOD! It was also a day for us to recognize some of our most important members of the AALEAD community: our volunteers!

Students set up a face painting booth and arm wrestling booth, among other carnival-esque games!

A raffle was held throughout the event giving out prizes such as AALEAD tote bags and gift cards!

The tug-of-war game was a tough competition between our MD and DC youth.

MD was victorious!

THANK YOU to all who came out and made the Lotus Festival a huge success!

We hope to see you next year!

AALEAD makes bagged lunches for those less fortunate

Students from AALEAD's Maryland High school and Middle school programs worked hard to make more than a hundred sandwiches for bagged lunches which were then donated to The Montgomery County Coalition for the Homeless. Each bagged lunch contained a sandwich, a piece of fruit and a bag of pretzels...it will provide a nutritious lunch to someone who otherwise would have to go without.

All of the AALEAD students gave up three very valuable hours of their spring time Saturday to come work hard to help others. We'd like to thank everyone that came out to help and we definitely appreciate the fact that all these kids decided to come help out on the weekend.

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Thank You Accenture for a computer lab and basement transformed!

On February 16, 2009, volunteers from Accenture came to help beautify our AALEAD Building. Their mission: (1) to paint and build new furniture for the computer lab and (2) to help us clean our basement.

Our computer lab was old, with faded white walls and mismatched furniture. Our basement was filled with junk that had accumulated over several years.

The volunteers worked tirelessly the entire afternoon, taping, painting, hauling junk into our dumpster, and they stayed long after their scheduled hours with us to finish the task!

The efforts of their hard work paid off! We were left with an amazingly vibrant computer lab and a clean basement!

Thank you Accenture volunteers, for your time and dedication!

Volunteering at DC Central Kitchen

On one of the coldest days in a long time, AALEAD students cared enough about helping out that they traveled the entire way from Maryland to downtown DC to help out at DC Central Kitchen, a non-profit aimed at, not only feeding the those less fortunate, but also training them with the valuable skills needed to start a career in food and help themselves.

For the shift, our students had bag after bag of carrots to tackle. Following a thorough introduction to the kitchen by Mason, a Central Kitchen staffer, students donned some stylish hairnets and aprons, pulled on some gloves and then teamed up. After that, Kitchen staff gave final instructions and students were turned loose (under supervision, of course), peelers in hand. Each team was responsible for sorting, cutting, peeling, chopping and washing their batch of carrots, after which the finished product was taken to another team who was in charge of preparing them to be cooked, then they were reloaded with another bin of carrots and the cycle started all over again.

By the end of the night, our students had prepared countless bins of carrots, which another team of students then cooked, strained, cooled and packed in vacuum sealed packages to be frozen. These packages can now be stored for up to a year and used on demand if there is an emergency need...

Many of the students have already expressed interested in going back, so don't be surprised if you see another post in the near future about DC Central Kitchen, Part II.

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2009 MLK Day (DC) "Preparing Youth for the Future"

Question: How many people can fit in the AALEAD building?
Answer: A lot more than we thought would fit!

On Monday, January 19th, 2009 over 50 volunteers from across the country came to AALEAD to participate in the Day of Service. (We expected to have about 15 volunteers!)

After a brief set of introductions, volunteers broke up into small groups with our high school youth to discuss different perspectives for the future. Each small group then came up with an acronym to summarize what they had talked about. The acronyms varied with discussions ranging from Deadlines for College to Preparedness to Parties and Socialization! All in all, youth had a very enriching time gaining valuable advice from such a diverse group of people.