By Maraithe Thomas, News Correspondent
Sitting on the edge of her seat in the first floor of the Curry Student Center, Laura Boston colorfully describes her three-year involvement with one of Northeastern’s fastest growing student groups: ‘ Social Change through Peace Games (SCtPG).
It’s Tuesday afternoon, and she just came from the Maurice J. Tobin K-8 School in Roxbury where she worked on an art project with the school’s students. Though Boston is currently the director of administration for the group, she has been a kind of renaissance woman for the community service-based organization since its inception.
SCtPG’ was founded by current Northeastern senior Alex Alvanos in 2007. The group started with only six student members. It has since grown’ to what Boston calls ‘a beast’ of more than 120 students. The group’s goal is to ’empower students to change the world’ and does so by teaching and spending time with youth in the local community. They work to help make students at grade schools around Northeastern into peacemakers, hoping to quell the cycle of youth violence in Boston, which remains an issue in the city, Boston said.
A recent Northeastern study showed there has been a sharp increase in homicides in Boston among young black males from 2000 to 2007. Boston is among six large cities that have seen the biggest increase in this area, up 12 percent over the past seven years.
Boston said the most effective way to make a change in this area is not only working with the students at local grade schools, but also getting involved with the students’ parents.
‘It is important to focus on both the school community and the larger community in which the school is located,’ she said.
Alvanos refers to’ Boston as the ‘glue’ of the organization.
‘She really holds all the information for us. We would come unraveled if it weren’t for her,’ he said.
As director of administration, Boston juggles a multitude of responsibilities, he said. ‘She’s done everything from teaching to working with teachers, doing visuals, leading different committees and a number of different on-campus [activities]. She plays whatever role is needed.’
Alvanos refers to’ Boston as the ‘glue’ of the organization. ‘She really holds all the information for us. We would come unraveled if it weren’t for her,’ he said.
Boston, who is a middler English major, said she has a history of participating in community service since high school, including frequenting Winchester Hospital, near her hometown of Reading.
With SCtPG, she focuses primarily on art-related projects when working with children at the Tobin School or one of SCtPG’s other grade schools, which include St. Patrick’s Grammar School and Oliver Holmes Elementary. She has designed murals for all three schools, she said.
‘I like doing art with the kids because it’s really interactive,’ Boston said. ‘It’s a relaxing way to spend time with them.’
SCtPG works with children in grades K-8.
On Martin Luther King Day, Boston volunteered at the MLK Day of Service along with more than 300 other college and high school aged students from the area. Boston helped lead an arts and crafts activity for the volunteers before heading out to the schools.
Kristen Simonelli, associate director of the Center of Community Service, as well as the advisor for SCtPG, has only praise for the group she said Boston has made ‘so enjoyable’ for her to advise.
‘They’re the best student group I could ever wish for,’ she said. ‘They have opened me up to so many new ways of thinking about how students can influence each other to be involved in service.’
The organization has programs before school, after school and during recess. They work not only with the students but with families and staff as well, inviting staff and parents to come to the school to participate in some of the arts and crafts activities they coordinate.
Boston said her goal is to become a teacher after graduating and continue her commitment to service and children.
‘There’s so much going on in the world that I can’t help but want to make a difference,’ Boston said.
‘These kids are going to be the ones who grow up in that community and if they can learn to be peacemakers, they’ll help encourage others to do the same and that’s something really exciting.’
