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Volunteers of the Year: 2024

August 27, 2024

This past school year, 262 unique volunteers completed 4,109 volunteer hours. These volunteers have tutored students, helped at events, and gone above and beyond to support 826 Boston’s mission of sharing students’ stories, amplifying their voices, and developing as leaders in school and in life.

Here are the recipients of the 2024 Volunteers of the Year along with what our team had to say about them.

Simon Xie began his service at Boston International Newcomers Academy (BINcA) last fall through a Boston College service learning arrangement. Simon is always punctual, communicative, gracious and can tackle any kind of task: MCAS tutoring, essay-writing, serving food at a publishing party—he’s up for anything! Even after his service program ended, he continued volunteering at BINcA. His dedication to the school community is commendable. In the spring semester, he partnered with the librarian to organize the new collection, build bookshelves, and support student librarians. Simon said he was also inspired daily by his time at BINcA.

Ann Bookman is a poet, professor, and weekly volunteer who has supported the student editorial board that produces Rubix, the literary magazine at the John D. O’Bryant School of Mathematics and Science. Ann led writing warm-ups for the club and planned and delivered a poetry workshop for students. They remarked how helpful it was to have someone review their pieces as closely as Ann did and this attention and care certainly elevated their writing. One highlight from Ann: hearing students read their own poems and stories at a launch party and being moved by their talent as writers.

To all the 826 Boston volunteers, thank you for all you do! We are so grateful to you all.

Sign up to volunteer today for the new school year!


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