Global Youth Service Day? More like Global Youth Service Days.

This year, Global Youth Service Day (GYSD) is making some radical changes. It will no longer be a day of service, but rather an ongoing service event.

“We will have around two weeks of service where we’ll have a number of different projects over the weekends or after school,” junior and Monroe County Youth Council member Lia Sokol said.

There were many factors that contributed to the changes made to this year’s GYSD, one of which being April 20’s walkout.

“Since [the walkout] was an incredible youth led initiative, our goal as MCYC was to promote youth in the community and give people the opportunity to do both GYSD and the walkout,” Sokol said.

Additionally, there was a change in the bus schedules that would have resulted in a shorter amount of time that could be spent at the service sites.   

All service projects will still occur at the same partner sites and will still be related to the original service projects; however, some service projects will be slightly altered in order to fit the partners’ needs. Additionally, the service opportunities will only be extended to the people who originally registered for GYSD.

Students will have the opportunity to participate in multiple service opportunities on multiple days.

“Our goal, by doing this, is to get more people and youth involved and to spread the word about service. We really hope that everyone who signed up for GYSD is able to participate, and we’re really excited to be helping out with any youth-led initiative that we can,” Sokol said.

Disclaimer: MCYC is a non-partisan group