CYNY Associate Board Supports Team Leader LACY Planning

Today’s guest blogger is Kim Gillman. Kim serves as the Individual Giving Manager with City Year New York in the Development Department. 

On Tuesday, December 10, the City Year New York Associate Board hosted a professional development event for Team Leaders. The Associate Board is a group of young professionals who support City Year in a number of ways, including LACY (Leadership After City Year) Support for corps members considering career and education opportunities beyond their year of service.

The event featured a panel of wonderful speakers, each of whom shared valuable insight about their experience navigating professional life. Panelists included:

• Sarah Sandelius* – Executive Director of Policy and Student Advocacy at New York City Department of Education, District 79
• Jonathan Horowitz, Program Officer – Philanthropic Services, JP Morgan Private Bank
• Greg Thomas – Campaigns Manager, DoSomething.org
• Moderator: Christine Foster* – VP, New Member Digital Targeting at American Express

A few golden nuggets of wisdom from the panel:

• Know the buzz words that are valuable in your industry of choice when crafting your resume and determine how to frame your experience accordingly.
• Mentors are important, but so are your peers and colleagues. Surround yourself with those who know you well and can help you think through your future aspirations.
• Always follow-up after you meet someone in a professional capacity; you never know where it could lead!

And there was a lot more great advice where that came from. The Associate Board hopes to replicate this event as a resource for more corps members as the year goes on. If you are interested in being a panelist at our next event, please reach out to Talia Bender at tbender@cityyear.org for more information.

A special thank you to all of our panelists and to the organizers of this event including Nathan Render, Andrew Olson, Sarah Sandelius, Hiro Sato, Alex Block, Lalita Advani and Amy Kingswell, with support from City Year Training Manager, Talia Bender, and Investment Community Board Member, Brad Hathaway.

*Associate Board Member

Preparing for Take Off After City Year

Today’s guest blogger is Grant Grimard, a corps member currently serving on the MS 424 Alcoa team in the South Bronx. He was recently given a special opportunity to explore the Corporate Pilot career he’d like to pursue after his year of service at City Year with the help of one of our sponsors, Alcoa. Read along to find out how it all unfolded. 

I was once told that opportunities are lost because they present themselves as hard work. Networking is not easy, and I’m talking sweaty palms and a dry throat for this guy. I had just finished giving a short speech at our Ripples of Hope Dinner when I decided to Carpe Diem. I confidently walked around the table I was sitting at and briefly introduced myself to those I hadn’t spoken with. I met a wonderful woman named Esra Ozer, Director of Executive Communications and Assistant Corporate Secretary of Alcoa Inc, and she was the spark to one of the coolest moments in my life. I mentioned my aspirations of becoming a Corporate Pilot one day and she replied, “It would be so cool for you to meet one of our Corporate Pilot’s at Alcoa!” She then gave me her business card and told me too email her the next day!

I emailed Ms. Ozer the following night, and within a couple of days she had set me up to meet the Chief Pilot at Alcoa! She scheduled for me to meet him on a Friday at the Westchester airport and that their company driver was going to be picking me up! I was told to look out for a black Mercedes and when I saw it, I was ready to live a day in the life of my dreams.

Grant poses for a quick photo before heading into the plane to meet the pilot and get a tour!

After a 30 minute drive to the airport I was finally there. It was a beautiful day and there were only a couple of clouds in the sky. We pulled up to Alcoa’s corporate jet and Arthur Sperring was standing outside of it, he was a tall gentleman, with a contagious personality. After an excited handshake, I was taken through a tour of their plane.

While walking through the plane, I couldn’t help but notice how right it felt. After the tour, we made our way to the cockpit. He let me sit in the left seat of the cockpit (captains seat) while he sat in the right (what an honor)! We conversed for a little over an hour and I asked him everything I could think of.  Mr. Sperring’s knowledge and passion for aviation was truly remarkable. He gave me invaluable advice and career-guidance that changed my life and made me even more motivated to become a Pilot.