City Year transforms the lives of two distinct sets of constituents — but it doesn’t stop there. Relying on powerful stories to engage them, it also transforms the lives of donors.

By Margaret Battistelli Gardner

“Whether you were the overachieving kid looking for the extracurricular activities or you were the troublemaker kid and there was a corps member in your class who’d been like you in fourth grade and who could save you from a lot of what he’d gone through … we could fill the day with stories about the transformative effects,” she adds. “Some of them are going to be about corps members, some of them are going to be from students, and some of them are from principals, superintendents. Any corps member, any school, any student can provide us with that story that connects donors and other people to City Year.”