 I'm Kathleen Alfiero and I'm the president of Celebrate Me, a nonprofit that supports educational projects that are uplifting and supportive to young people. And I'm here with Katie today to talk about painting for a purpose. Painting for a purpose is a wonderful project that combines the interest and understanding of the gift of art with education and helps youth contribute to their communities. And Katie, you are one of the recipients of the grants that is used and the money gained from an auction once a year where people paint and kids and adults paint and beautiful things are auctioned off and the money then is given to people like you. So can you tell us a little bit about yourself? I'm 17. I attend PAVs and I go to the early childhood program and I worked at Wolfsnack and I really just want to kind of get the kids involved in all of it. Yeah, so you're pretty interested in young people in particular like pre-K kids. Yeah, I'm like if I could make a career out of farming and teaching then it definitely would be something I do. Can you tell us a little bit about your project that excites you? Well, working at, like I guess a little background, working at Wolfsnack, we are very involved with the public so we worked with the little summer campers and teaching them and just then switching to the kids at PAVs. They don't really know a lot like they live in the city and they don't know like the whole farm experience so I thought it would be a great idea to kind of get them exposed and have them a little bit more, give them more knowledge than just, you know, looking at a picture of a cow instead of actually like seeing one and petting it. And I think I understand that your project has a lot to do with the appreciation of good nutrition. Yes, my, it's harder for kids to understand the whole nutritious what's good and what's bad and where food comes from. So I thought if they got the opportunity to look at a farm and see this is where your food comes from then it would help them understand that factory foods, factory processed foods aren't as nutritious as farm foods. So what will happen with the grant monies? What will the kids do? They're going on a field trip to Wolfsnack Farm which is where we are. And they're, they're milking goats and going on a hay ride to tour the farm and see how big it is. And they planted seeds and they got to learn the life cycle of an egg. Ooh, exciting. And you're excited about it so how are you going to help them to become excited? What is it that you're going to bring to it? Well, we're doing a four week unit on Things That Grow so we're just giving them exciting projects about how they can, I mean they planted grass seeds on Monday and they're, we're just giving them projects to like get them excited about. When you heard that you got the grant, what did that feel like? It felt really good. I was like jumping in my chair. It was exciting to know that I could make a difference. And let's talk a little bit about that even if what? Even if they get small, it's not small. Yeah, talk about that. Nothing is small, huh? Yeah, I thought like it's just one class. It's 18 preschoolers. It might not, they might not get as much as it, as they want, I want them to but like on the bus ride here some of the kids just on the way were like, oh wow that's a big tree. I've never seen one that big before. So just the experience of it is like a whole different world and it's not changing all of the school but it's changing just one classroom. How did you feel when they were getting excited? I felt really good. I was like, yay. I'm wondering if you realize you're a leader. Yeah, I didn't really think I was a leader until this year when I was working with the kids and I realized I was a big role model to them and I'm giving them the knowledge that I got when I was little. How does it feel to know that you absolutely have good ideas and that people are listening to your good ideas? It feels good because most junior high school girls are like, oh no one's listening to me, I can't do anything but can. Yeah, would you like more people to understand about this? Yeah, because there's not, agriculture and good nutrition are tied and not a lot of people understand what they're eating and it would be great for people to just understand and not just go to the grocery store and pick up some carrots and not know the whole process. I have another company that's called Appreciation Unlimited and I'm thinking about the title of my company when you're talking because what I'm hearing you say is that you do appreciate what you have to offer and at the same time you appreciate the enthusiasm that you're influencing through your own enthusiasm. You understand that life is about fun. Do you have fun? Are you having fun? Oh yeah. Fun is what we do at the farm, it equally as fun as we do work. So how will you know when your project has made a difference? When I just hear someone say like, oh this is like a healthy food and this one isn't or we learned this at the farm and just kind of not even them telling me but hear them tell a peer or just share the information, it's never really done it's just always going to keep expanding. Are you inspired to keep coming up with new ideas as a result of this? Yeah, I definitely am. Yeah. And what are you thinking about? I'm not sure yet. I'm going to keep thinking and maybe if I go to a different school I can do something similar. And as this progresses you'll get more and more ideas and more and more enthusiasm and it will spread and joy spreads. And you are delightful and I am excited for you for all of this and I'm particularly excited that painting for a purpose about the arts is allowing you to express yourself this way. Congratulations. Thank you.