Owego teens travel to Alaska for Community Service and Leadership Training

Seldom does an opportunity reach the youth of Owego like traveling to Alaska. Gabriel O’Donnell, Sullivan O’Donnell and Graham T. Strolin, students at Owego Free Academy, were invited by the Charles H. Bassett Youth Foundation to attend the Points of Light Youth Institute (PYLI) in Anchorage, Alaska earlier this month. 

PYLI offers the chance to learn about planning, implementation, and diversity. This once-in-a-lifetime opportunity broadened the horizons of the future for these three young men; they learned just how large the world is and the value of good leadership.

PYLI is a leadership-training program in Anchorage, Alaska. In its 25th year, the training opportunity is led by Robert “Beau” Bassett, and held in the chapel of the Salvation Army. Twenty-one Alaskan students and the three students from Owego attended from March 7-11, during the spring break of the Alaskan public schools.

These days were filled with many different activities, including group projects, writing opportunities and critical thinking prompts, asking young men and women to define Leadership and ways to implement it in the real world. The participants practiced this by recreating real problems that they encountered in their communities. For example, we worked to theorize solutions to drug and alcohol abuse as it was a large problem in all of the communities that the students were from.

The student cohort was very diverse, including kids from the schools in Anchorage, Alaskan Natives, and the three Owego youth. Some Alaskan students previously lived in other countries including El Salvador, Guam, Ukraine, and the Philippines. Learning how to work and socialize with them was an incredibly valuable experience. 

Making the 4,000-mile trip to Alaska alone was a real opportunity for these Owego friends to test themselves. The boys’ travel to Anchorage was a full day airborne, consisting of a 1.5-hour flight from Newark to Atlanta and a 7.5-hour flight from Atlanta to Anchorage. 

Twenty-two hours after leaving Owego, they landed in Anchorage. Upon arrival, the mountains surrounding Anchorage and the beauty of the Pacific Ocean immediately impressed them. The mountains provided an amazing backdrop to some of the same chain stores similar to those in the Southern Tier. 

While in Alaska, the boys were lucky enough to see the Iditarod, a famous dog sled race, kick-off, and were given time to see native Alaskan handcrafts. They spent the week with Robert “Beau” Bassett, taking some responsibility for cooking meals, which helped them grow together as friends and learn more about self-sufficiency.

Each of the boys took away valuable life lessons, and the experience has had a profound impact on their lives. 

Strolin shared, “I learned in my time in PYLI how to include people from different cultures in community service projects. I look forward to doing more service projects in Owego.” 

Gabriel O’Donnell said, “I learned about the grandness of the world and about the amazing cultures that it has to offer. I hope to one day travel and meet more of these cultures.” 

Sullivan O’Donnell learned, “Leadership is a combination of planning, implementing, diversity, understanding, and so much more. This creates the ability to solve many of the problems we see in our vastly different communities today.”