City Year Columbus

Discover how City Year alumni are making an impact beyond graduation; see how service can launch your next chapter!

Planning for life after City Year: Different paths for different AmeriCorps members - City Year We encourage AmeriCorps members to reflect how they have also personally grown and stay connected with each other after graduation as they plan for a career.

As we head into summer, we want to take a moment to celebrate our incredible Impact Managers and our Learning & Evaluation Director—Imani Miller, Ileesha White, Sam Davis, and Taylour Aungst 🌟

This year, they poured countless hours into planning, leading professional development, coaching, building meaningful relationships, and always keeping student impact at the center of it all.

There are never enough words to fully capture our appreciation. Because of their dedication, City Year Columbus continues to grow into the strongest program possible—for our AmeriCorps Volunteers, students, school partners, and the entire Columbus community.

We truly wouldn’t be where we are without them. ❤️

Please join us in celebrating our Priscilla Tyson Leadership Award winners ✨
This award honors corps members who lead with purpose, empower others, strengthen their communities, and inspire us all.

💙 Julia Reidy
Julia truly embodies belief in the power of young people. Through innovative instruction, meaningful relationships, and even launching a student book club, she helped her students grow in confidence, skill, and love of learning. Her impact is nothing short of extraordinary.

💛 Ardon Wu
Ardon leads with empathy, intention, and heart. From supporting students and teachers to creating joy and connection across his team, he consistently asked, “How can I make a difference?”—and delivered, every single day.

💜 Tiara Hale
Tiara made an immediate impact through her passion, advocacy, and deep commitment to her students and community. She builds meaningful connections, creates inclusive spaces, and inspires others to grow—all while leading with courage and authenticity.

We are so proud to celebrate these incredible leaders and the lasting impact they’ve made!

Every year we celebrate Columbus City Schools educators that go above and beyond to support students, strengthen school communities, and uplift our City Year teams with the Bridge Builder Award. 💙 This year we are so honored to award:

💙 Melissa Shook | Trevitt Elementary
Ms. Shook’s passion for empowering students is unmatched. She reminds every child they are valued and capable of extraordinary things. She collaborates with everyone to ensure students get the strongest support—always listening and incorporating others’ perspectives. Every interaction is intentional and grounded in care.

💛 Andrew Ernst | Westmoor Middle
Mr. Ernst leads by example every day. His dedication to students and commitment to breaking down barriers set him apart.
Even across two schools, he shows up with consistency, joy, and purpose—helping students overcome challenges and thrive. His support is intentional and deeply rooted in a belief that collaboration strengthens outcomes for students 🌟

We’re so grateful for both of you—thank you for building bridges and changing lives!

Last Friday, we celebrated the graduation of our 2025–2026 AmeriCorps members 🎉

In just 10.5 months, this incredible group gave 42,160 hours of direct service to the Columbus community and Columbus City Schools students 💙

They also invested over 7,000 hours in their own growth—building skills as mentors, tutors, and leaders that will last far beyond their service year.

Service takes dedication, perseverance, adaptability, and teamwork—and this cohort showed up with all of that and more. Their belief in their students and their communities has been truly inspiring ✨
We’re so proud of you and can’t wait to see what’s next!

Help us carry this impact forward. Make a gift today to support the next class of AmeriCorps members and ensure more students in Columbus have the mentors and support they deserve https://support.cityyear.org/campaign/801898/donate

What a special day! 🎉

Today marks our corps’ final day of service—and we got to celebrate it alongside Deloitte Cares Day 💙

We’re incredibly grateful to our amazing Deloitte Volunteers for joining us to create pencil pouches filled with school supplies for our students. These will be shared on the first day of school to welcome them back and kick off an incredible year ahead! ✏️📚✨

Feeling so thankful for partnerships like Deloitte that help us end the year strong and set our students up for success.

Here’s to impact, community, and new beginnings!

At our recent networking event, AmeriCorps members stepped into a relaxed, real-world experience—putting their skills into practice while connecting with incredible community champions, leaders, and mentors across a variety of career fields.

Thank you to all who joined us and made the afternoon so meaningful. Your guidance and conversations helped bring this experience to life!

As we close out the service year, our Corps spent yesterday afternoon giving back and supporting organizations across our community

Huge thank you to Dress for Success Columbus, Furniture Bank of Central Ohio, and Franklinton Farms for welcoming our members—we had such a fun and meaningful time supporting your work!

Grateful to close out this Corps service year making an impact together

✨ It’s the final week of service for our incredible AmeriCorps members! ✨

What a year it’s been—full of laughter, connection, collaboration, and so much growth. Not just for the students we serve, but for every AmeriCorps member and staff person along the way.

We’re so proud to celebrate this amazing 2025–2026 Corps and all they’ve accomplished.

We can’t wait to see the impact they’ll continue to make beyond this service year.

Earlier this month, our incredible AmeriCorps members came together for a meaningful service project to support our students as we head into summer.

They created over 150 hygiene kits and completed the assembly of 200 Student Close-Out kits alongside our partners at Moody Nolan—ensuring our students have the essentials they need to kick off summer learning strong.

These kits were distributed across all five of our partner schools, supporting the students we have the privilege of working with every day this school year.

We’re so grateful for the dedication, teamwork, and heart that made this possible!