Eastside Pathways has always been dedicated to helping the children in our community thrive. This month, we interviewed three of the fantastic youth working among us to make a collective impact. Rachel Lau, Zach England, and Kate Chen shared their experiences of becoming involved with the partnership and how we can further encourage youth involvement within Eastside Pathways.
Left to right: Rachel Lau, Zach England, and Kate Chen
Rachel Lau, a junior at Lakeside School, serves on the Eastside Pathways Board of Directors. She is also an active member of Bellevue Youth Link, serving as a board member, and of Bellevue Youth Court, serving as a judge, trainer, and advocate as well as the Washington State Youth Court Association (WSYCA) Vice President.
Zach England, a senior at Bellevue High School, excels on the Wolverine football and wrestling teams. He currently serves on the Eastside Pathways Board, and for enjoyment, he plays a couple of instruments as a busker at Pike Place Market.
Kate Chen is a senior at Interlake High School who works with the backbone staff as a communications intern. Outside of Eastside Pathways, she works on many projects with Bellevue Councilmember Conrad Lee, and is Co-President of SPARK, a nonprofit summer science camp she co-founded in 2014.
As a student, what motivated you to become active in your community?
Rachel: I first became active in my community through Bellevue Youth Link, a leadership program by the City of Bellevue and the Bellevue School District. I joined the program because of my older cousins, but I stayed because I realized that volunteerism not only helped me gain skills in communication, leadership, and teamwork but also provided crucial support to youth with less privilege in my community. It also allows me to work with youth and adults that I otherwise would not interact with in my community.
Zach: I think it has always been in my nature to want to help people and develop cohesive, accepting communities. For example, on the first day of kindergarten, I showed up with my phone number on a bunch of slips of paper and told people to call it if they want to set up a playdate. I love to talk to people and try to grow through the relationships I have with the people around me. In Bellevue, there are tons of people from different backgrounds and being active in my community allows me to learn from many different perspectives. I love it.
Kate: Finding ways to become involved in my community became easier and easier as I began working with Councilmember Lee, and I figured that if I could put my skills and effort into something that made an impact, why not? I enjoy doing and creating, and as a high school student, the resources offered by nonprofits like Eastside Pathways are opportunities to take advantage of. For me, it’s not a question of whether or not I should be involved in my community, but rather, what I can do and with who.
How did you find out about Eastside Pathways?
Rachel: I found out about Eastside Pathways through my work on the Bellevue Youth Link Board — the Board was looking for an additional youth liaison to Eastside Pathways and Eastside Pathways Board was looking for a new youth member. I did some research on the work that Eastside Pathways does and decided to join in order to learn more about different types of non-profit organizations and the behind-the-scenes work that is needed to run the organization as whole.
Zach: I found out about Eastside Pathways in seventh grade through one of the organizations I have been volunteering with since sixth grade, the City of Bellevue’s Youth Link. Eastside Pathways was having meetings with youth in the Bellevue community at the Ground Zero Teen Center in Lake Hills. I think their purpose was to get an understanding of what youth think of Eastside Pathways’ mission for their success. I went to all the meetings and put myself in leadership positions and really enjoyed thinking about the concept of collective impact and creating success in our youth from the time they are conceived to the time they go into their careers. After a couple of months, the meetings ended, and I didn’t hear a lot about Eastside Pathways for a while. A couple years later, I got promoted to the Youth Link Board, where we have one person sit on the Eastside Pathways Board to report back to Youth Link on the affairs of Eastside Pathways. As our past EP Liaison was graduating and I had experience with the mission of EP, I got the opportunity to sit on the Eastside Pathways Board.
Kate: I was browsing my school’s announcements in the career center when I came upon an ad for a social media internship position. I had been looking for opportunities to expand my skill sets and experience working within greater organizations, so I immediately became interested. Although I did not view Eastside Pathways as the collective impact platform that I know it to be today, given any opportunity within the organization, I would have taken it anyway.
What have you learned or taken away from your involvement with Eastside Pathways?
Rachel: Become involved in Eastside Pathways was my first encounter with the collective impact model, so learning about the relationship between the backbone organization and partnerships has been a new experience. I’ve also learned a lot about jumping head first into a new project and asking the right questions to become oriented in a new space, mission, and group of people.
Zach: I have learned a whole lot from Eastside Pathways. For starters, the idea of collective impact is one that will definitely stick with me. Also, Eastside Pathways has guided me to grow and learn so much about race and equity in America. They allowed me to come along to a racial equity training in Portland one year and that event has forever changed the way I think about and live life. It has opened many other doors to continue learning. On another hand, Eastside Pathways has helped me develop my voice and ability to communicate effectively. Having been the only youth on the board for a couple years challenged me to think critically and carefully formulate and share my opinion. I had to represent and advocate for the youth in my community who all come from different backgrounds. It’s a lot to think about and I am glad I got the opportunity to be challenged by and grow from it.
Kate: Despite my involvement being more related to the technical and operational side of Eastside Pathways, being introduced to and learning about the collective impact model has influenced the way I perceive how one person can make a greater impact, and it is a model that I have referenced in developing and expanding my own organizations. Other than that, I have of course learned a lot when it comes to social media, communications, and meeting deadlines.
How can we further involve students/youth in Eastside Pathways?
Rachel: I think that involving more youth in the Eastside Pathways Board is a great idea since the mission of Eastside Pathways is to educate youth and improve the lives of youth on the Eastside, but I also think that, at the moment, joining the board would be quite daunting for a student if they have little prior experience with working with adults. Also, although orientation sessions are available for new board members, youth often cannot attend events during school hours — this is a major barrier if Eastside Pathways is looking to have more youth members on the board. Overall, I think that the partnership between Eastside Pathways and Bellevue Youth Link has a lot of potential for further involving youth in this organization.
Zach: Eastside Pathways has so many great collaborative projects that youth could provide many innovative and legitimate suggestions to, but the meeting times are really impractical for the potential of any student involvement. My thought for a solution would be having a Youth Collaborative where they can review updates from the collaborative projects and provide suggestions from a valuable youth voice. The meeting time should not be set during the school day, but maybe a convenient time after school or on a weekend.
Kate: We have so many smart, capable, and wonderful students in our community, but I believe youth are often contained to the extracurriculars within their schools or Bellevue City Hall due to the easy accessibility as well as specific design targeting youth involvement. I believe if there was more exposure to the work that Eastside Pathways is doing and indicated opportunity, youth could be incentivized by the prospect of making an impact as well as gaining the experience in developing crucial leadership skills. Of course, there are also many youth who take initiative within an organization that is not specifically designed as a student growth experience, such as Rachel and Zach, and youth can also encourage youth to be
Eastside Pathways wishes to thank Rachel, Zach, and Kate for their commitment and for sharing their perspectives here. Being able to hear the youth voice is so important within a community, and we hope Eastside Pathways can help and become a platform for student views to be expressed. These three are just a few examples of the many ways students are becoming involved within our community. We are excited to support their continued leadership and eager to deepen the role of youth voice in the partnership.
If you know a youth (or you are a youth!) who would like to get involved with Eastside Pathways, come learn more at our next Eastside Pathways 101 event on April 26.