Boys & Girls Club column: Completing a project is rewarding

For many of us, there is no greater satisfaction than completing a project. This can be especially rewarding when a project results in a tangible thing. After hours of work, with physical evidence of mission accomplished stacked neatly on the workbench, the maker is replete.

At the Boys & Girls Club of Henderson County, our products are people — children to be exact, especially those who need us most. Daily, we work with hundreds of them, helping to shape them into productive, responsible, caring citizens through academic success, healthy living and positive personal decisions.

The thing is, it can take a while.

Since our process stretches out from kindergarten to graduation, patience is paramount. During these slower times, many of us crave proof of progress. Collecting written feedback is a great way to do this. Recently, we polled our members using this prompt: I am grateful for the Boys & Girls Club because...

Garrett, a fourth-grade member, wrote, “The Club is all I ever dreamed of, and I love it with all of my heart. I like how it’s clean and how the rooms are decorated.”

Fellow fourth-grader, Sidney, touched on safety. “You can trust the Boys & Girls Club because they will not let a stranger pick you up. They also teach you not to do drugs. (You do NOT want your kids doing drugs!)”

Adrian, a middle schooler, reflected on how he loves the homework support he receives. “They encourage us in Power Hour,” he said. “Another good thing is that for kids who came here before me, if they tried hard, they made it all the way to college!”

Second-grader Sage was grateful because the people at the Club “never leave me hanging. If I’m in trouble, they handle it.”

And according to third-grader Mia, it’s quite simple. “Y'all are like my family,” she wrote. “You keep me safe and fix my problems.”

Like Mia and Garrett and Sage, J.C. is a product of the Boys & Girls Club too. The only difference is that, today, he’s a card-carrying adult, a productive responsible, caring citizen. The finished product, you could say.

Growing up in Panama City Beach, J.C. was a beach kid. His parents owned and worked at a hotel, giving them a clear view into the temptations and pitfalls associated with Spring Break culture. By the late 1990’s, they saw much of the beach becoming less than family-friendly for J.C. and his brothers, and so they looked for a youth program for the kids to attend in the summer months.

This was how J.C. was introduced to the Boys & Girls Clubs of Bay County at Frank Brown Park. But it wasn’t love at first sight. Being a rebellious teen, he balked that the idea of going to “day care” five days a week, especially when all of his friends were soaking up the rays on the beach and cruising the strip.

It didn’t take long for J.C. to warm up to the Club. In fact, today he will tell you that it defied his expectations. He and his brothers were immediately welcomed as part of the Club family. One week eventually turned into consecutive years of membership. Every day was fun, engaging and educational, and J.C. learned how important it was not only to be a part of the community, but to serve others and to give back.

That was J.C.’s biggest takeaway from his Club experience and this is precisely why he later chose to work for the Boys & Girls Club, starting as a youth development professional and working his way up through the ranks to become area director. And now, he has accepted a new opportunity in our own neck of the woods.

This month, J.C. Schwab takes the reins as Executive Director of the Boys & Girls Club of Henderson County. At his new post, he will have the distinct pleasure of meeting mission-in-progress kids like Mia, Garrett, and Sage, and he will lead this organization into its next great future phase. He will also have the distinct pleasure of meeting you, the people who have helped build our Club into the organization that it is today.

Help us welcome J.C. to our Club family. He is the real deal, friends. The Boys & Girls Club mission accomplished.

Julia Hockenberry is the outgoing executive director of the Boys & Girls Club of Henderson County.