Volunteer of the Month: Charlie Sconiers

Commonpoint Queens is pleased to recognize Charlie Sconiers as its Volunteer of the Month for January 2021. Charlie began volunteering at Commonpoint Queens on December 22, 2020. Since then, she has found time from her busy high school schedule to serve over 47 hours. Charlie is an exemplar of youth leadership and has demonstrated maturity and wisdom far beyond her years.

Charlie was born in Brooklyn but now lives and goes to school in Queens. She is currently a junior at Christ the King High School and plans to major in health sciences in college to pursue a career as a cardiac surgeon. Ever since elementary school, Charlie has been interested in working in the medical field, and she developed a specific appeal to cardiac work due to my grandfather’s heart problems. Through her grandfather’s health struggles, Charlie realized the importance of heart doctors in the medical field and decided that she wanted to directly contribute to this effort. Charlie has been tutoring for school since sixth grade and cannot wait to carry out this skill into her volunteering at Commonpoint Queens.

How did you hear about Commonpoint Queens and its volunteer opportunities?
I heard about volunteering in Commonpoint Queens through my high school religion teacher. He gave me a list of many locations to volunteer at and the Sam Field Center was one of them.

Why did you choose to volunteer at the food pantry as opposed to another opportunity? I chose to volunteer at the food pantry because the Sam Field Center is very close to where I live, unlike the other organizations I knew of that offered service hours. Also, the convenient scheduling and being able to pick my own service projects allowed me to effectively volunteer and help others in my community while being a full-time student.

What were your expectations going into volunteering with us for the first time? When I volunteered with Commonpoint for the first time, I didn’t have any expectations since it was my first time ever volunteering outside of my school.

What was your experience like volunteering with us for the first time? My first experience volunteering with Commonpoint was making paper flowers for homebound seniors. I loved this activity because not only was the process of making the flowers fun and creative, but I also learned a new decoration skill that I will use long-term. It definitely exceeded my expectations.

How often do you expect to volunteer with us going forward?
Although I started volunteering to earn service hours for my school, volunteering has been such an enjoyable and uplifting experience! I will continue to volunteer weekly, and I can definitely see myself volunteering with Commonpoint after high school.

To learn more about our volunteer opportunities, visit commonpointqueens.org/volunteer.