Prompt 1: Please share a volunteer experience and its impact on your life.

    I believe that as humans, we have two unique responsibilities: we must be stewards of the planet and we must help those who are less fortunate than ourselves.  In my mind, “those less fortunate” refers to all of God’s creatures, not just other human beings.  My work at The C.A.R.E. Foundation has been focused on helping wild and domesticated animals that have no other place to turn. 
    I started volunteering at The C.A.R.E. Foundation in 2003, when it was located fifteen minutes from my home. C.A.R.E. is a non-profit wildlife sanctuary that houses over a hundred exotic and domestic animals, including eight big cats and two bears. The purpose of C.A.R.E. is to provide these non-releasable animals with a permanent home. In the process, C.A.R.E. has saved the lives of many unwanted and abused animals. I’ve always been an animal lover and wanted to work at a wildlife refuge. When I’d toured the C.A.R.E. facilities, I asked the Executive Director, Christin Buford, if I was old enough to volunteer there. She said I would need a parent with me at all times to volunteer. Christin was sure that someone so young would lose interest fairly quickly, so she didn’t mind an eleven-year-old volunteering just once to see what it was really like.
    My first time out, I was told to clean the ferret cages. Anyone who owns a ferret knows this is not a glamorous job. Many eleven-year olds would have never come back after that experience. But I did. I came back every Saturday morning. Christin and other staff took a liking to me because I worked hard, wanted to learn, and was mature for my age. I stilled cleaned the ferrets, but I also got to help feed the animals. I gradually began to get more responsibility around the compound, and when C.A.R.E. adopted a baby Florida panther and a black bear cub that was going to be put up for auction, I was able to help hand raise both of them. I bottle-fed them and even helped with their training, and in the process, I learned many lessons about how not to approach a wild animal. I continued this gratifying work throughout 2004, when the compound was devastated by the three hurricanes that hit Central Florida.  At that point, most of our efforts became focused on salvaging and repairing what was left of the site.
    As a senior volunteer, my job for the past six years has been to feed and bathe these animals, clean their cages and build habitats for them. I've also worked to educate the public about indigenous Florida wildlife and proper animal care. I take great pride in knowing that I am personally responsible for the rehabilitation of several of abused animals. Abused and neglected animals that end up at C.A.R.E. need to heal both physically and mentally and volunteers help these animals to do just this. I have rescued, nurtured, and re-trained dozens of animals with tragic pasts, which have subsequently made remarkable recoveries.
    C.A.R.E. has several dozen regular volunteers, but special projects like building new habitats require a lot more people to get the job done. Additionally, it’s always important to continually locate and train new volunteers, and I’ve made it part of my mission to find these new recruits. I’ve organized groups of students at my high school to volunteer, and done work at local middle schools to generate interest in volunteering at the compound. I’ve also spoken at local businesses both to drum up financial support for C.A.R.E. as well as to find potential volunteers.  As a result of my efforts, over 65 individuals have volunteered on special projects for C.A.RE.  Volunteers are the heart of The C.A.R.E. Foundation, and our work is critical to the success of the organization.
    Through encouraging others to get involved at C.A.R.E., I recruited staff from MSCW, an Orlando-based design firm, who donated hundreds of hours at C.A.R.E. Working with me and other C.A.R.E. staff, volunteers from MSCW built a jaguar enclosure, a tiger run, a skunk area, and doggie condos, and landscaped the compound. Through MSCW, I raised over $5000 for C.A.R.E. MSCW is just one example of the businesses I encouraged to donate time and money to C.A.R.E., and one example of a small group of people working together to make a better world.
    The work at C.A.R.E. is never finished.  Each month, more abandoned and/or abused animals are dropped off on our doorstep.  These new arrivals are usually dogs, reptiles or ferrets, but sometimes Animal Control brings us raccoons or something more exotic, like the three Capuchins and one Spider monkey they entrusted to us in August. C.A.R.E., like hundreds of other wildlife sanctuaries across the country, provides a critical service for wildlife rescue, and we are always looking for help.
    When C.A.R.E. acquired a property in Apopka, FL, I continued volunteering even though the commute increased from fifteen minutes to an hour both ways. I couldn’t give up volunteering at C.A.R.E. because it was such gratifying work. But I’m definitely not saying that volunteering is glamorous. Volunteering at C.A.R.E. isn’t always easy: I’ve been bitten several times, never badly, and always because I made a stupid mistake with the animal involved. The work is hard: both rebuilding the compound after the hurricanes in Florida and building a new compound in Apopka from scratch has been back breaking manual labor. I’ve built habitats in the Florida heat, and been so filthy from playing with the animals that I thought I would never be clean. But volunteering at C.A.R.E. is the most rewarding experience of my life, and I wouldn’t give it up for anything.
    I’m staying in the area for college and I will continue to actively volunteer at C.A.R.E., because I believe in their mission. I am also passionate about the work we can do as volunteers. Volunteers work tirelessly to make sure these animals have the proper food, shelter, water, exercise, medical attention and love they need. I’m convinced that as volunteers, we receive rewards that far surpass the blood, sweat and tears we put into our work.  Finally, I’m convinced that we have a God-given responsibility to take care of this planet and all the creatures that inhabit it. I believe that to make a difference in someone’s life, even if that someone is not human, is the most important thing in the world.