VT Seva Cary held our Halloween Hungama Carnival on October 24, 2021. This event was a Halloween Carnival for special-needs children which included different activities and fun experiences for the kids to participate in. During this event, we organized a variety of activities, such as Sack Racing, Painting, Pumpkin Toss, and the kids took pictures in front of our Halloween banner. We had 16 volunteers participate in this Halloween event. Throughout the event, our volunteers did an exceptional job handling the children that attended, and were extremely patient. Our volunteers interacted with the children to entertain them We had a lot of fun doing this event, and hope to participate in the future too!

The FS Series Cupcake Marathon took place on the 16th of October at Brier Creek Commons in Raleigh. During this event, various individuals, kids, teens, adults, and seniors, all participated in a 5K marathon and ended up with a t-shirt, a medal, and a cupcake. VT Seva played a big role in this event, with 8 volunteers working to provide water bottles to the tired and thirsty runners in the event as well as the volunteers cheering them on as they were running past the water stand. The volunteers had a great time participating in this event as they were able to help and encourage the runners in their efforts to complete the marathon and were very well received by the runners as they passed by the water stand. Also, following the marathon itself, some of the volunteers helped disassemble the tables and stands and helped wrap up the event. All in all, this volunteering event was a great experience for the VT Seva volunteers as they were able to help the runners through the marathon by providing them with water bottles and cheering them on, and also, the volunteers as a result made the experience that much better for the runners themselves.

VT Seva Cary volunteers on July 31st, our volunteers participated in the Adopt-A-Highway event. Volunteers cleaned 3 miles on Green Level Church Rd, between the Morrisville Pkwy & Carpenter Fire station road Intersections. VT Seva Cary did a fantastic cleanup as part of the Adopt A highway program.

VT Seva Cary conducted virtual summer camp in the month of JULY for elementary & middle school kids. Camp offered from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm . Below tutors did awesome job with their great teaching skills. They showed a lot patience in handling the kids especially with different grades of kids. Mahathi Mallela, Parnika Dandepally, Siddharth Malireddi,Sribhaavita Nekkalapudi,Neeraja Boppana,Suchir Madap,Aneesh Yarlagadda,Akhil Dammalapati, Rohitha Sanka,Thanuj Desu,Nithya Janapati,Ashrith Desu,Saran Chittela,Rahul Solleti,Anish Voota,Ishani Dasyam, Sarayu Buchireddygari KUDOS to all you for your patience & talents!! Parents were very happy and appreciated with great feed back about tutors in handling this camp We appreciate each tutor to support for taking the ownership and supporting the younger kids in this summer and raising funds to help our visually challenged kids.

Recently, VT Seva Cary had their June Monthly Meeting. The Youth Board talked about the process to enter volunteers’ hours for their volunteering events. After that, we also had one of our youth volunteers, Anish Voota, talk about the volunteering experience that he led in his community. Anish and his group led a talent show throughout his community for all ages. Anish told us about the process of starting this talent show and spreading the message across his community. Anish conducted this talent show to help support visually challenged kids and VT Seva's Mission and Vision. Following Anish’s spotlight, the Youth Board discussed the upcoming VT Seva Summer Camp and talked about the summer camp details. Towards the end of the meeting, volunteers were informed about the Essay Writing Boot Camp for rising seniors, taught by a former VT Seva Youth Board President and high school graduate, Chandu Changalvala. Our volunteers played a fun and entertaining game to end the meeting.

Occurring on June 19th, 20th, 26th, and 27th in 2021, Chandu Changalvala led a workshop for rising 12th graders to talk about her experience writing college essays and discussing some points about writing essays. Chandu is a rising college freshman, heading to the University of North Carolina at Charlotte on the Levine Scholarship, and a former VT Seva Cary Youthboard President in 2020-2021. On the first day of the camp, Chandu communicated to the students about the information on the college application process and the timeline of applications, including types of applications and their requirements. During the second day, the students brainstormed different topics they were interested in, with their own life lessons, and created rough drafts of essays for those topics. On the third day of the boot camp, they chose the essay draft they liked the most and wrote another draft of that chosen topic. Chandu also met with each student individually and discussed things they can change about their essay draft. On the last day of the camp, the students made their final essay drafts of their chosen topic and met with Chandu for any questions they had. The students came out of this boot camp with a great understanding of college essay writing and had a well-written college essay, as all funds and proceeds have been donated to Bharat Covid Relief Fund, for COVID-19 relief for India.

VT Seva Cary conducted a Virtual Workshop on "WILL with Living Trust" on June 13th,2021 by Ram Nimma from 3pm- 4:30pm. The session was successful and went well with 25 participants. Please find the high-level topics that were covered during the workshop 1.WILL with Living Trust 2.Last Will and Testament 3.Probate Avoidance Living Trust 4.Power of Attorney 5.Commerical & Personal Insurance The session concluded with Q & A on Will and insurance

VT Seva Cary recently held their May monthly meeting. Youth volunteers discussed about VT Seva's pillars and study tips for their upcoming exams. For this meeting we had about 25 volunteers attend the meeting. The session began with reviewing the process of how to enter your hours, next up we had the youthboard talk about some study tips because we all know, May is the month of exams! Later on, we had one of our volunteers, Lasya Tula, sing her favorite Carnatic song as our monthly spotlight. After that, we had Aneesh Y and Team talk about their science club and what they will be teaching, the topics, how long the club will go on and when to sign up. Following the informational discussion, VT Seva Branch directors announced the Earth Competition Winners who were Lasya Tula, Ishani Dasyam and Anirudh Janapati and fund raising tips to support VT Seva pillars.

VT Seva Cary conducted their April Monthly Meeting on April 17th, 2021. At the beginning of the meeting, the new 2021 youth board was introduced. They are: Thanuj Desu - President Rohitha Sanka - Vice President Mahathi Mallela - Secretary Nithya Janapati - Associate Secretary Sribhaavita Nekkalapudi - Communications Lead Manasvini Gudibandi - Associate Communication Lead Then, announcing about the most important volunteering opportunity of the month, Sribhaavita Nekkalapudi explained about VT Seva Cary’s ‘Research’ competition for Earth Day. For this competition, each participating volunteer was asked to choose a topic and research a specific question about the chosen topic. Manasvini Gudibandi then talked about the ‘Take Action’ Competition for Earth Day. For this competition, each participating volunteer was asked to choose a topic and take action on a question about that topic. After that, Siddharth Malireddy gave a violin performance as this month’s spotlight. He performed the national anthems of the United States and India. Following the violin performance, one of our core volunteers at VT Seva Cary and long time follower of Sri Chinna Jeeyar Swamiji, Aravind Swamy, shared his experience on volunteering with VT Seva, and how volunteering helps many in need. Next, there was a discussion about communication and social media and how to utilize the platforms to share our activities, spread the word and inspire others about volunteering. Later volunteers were informed about the upcoming summer camp and how they can participate in the camp. Finally, volunteers concluded the session with a game of Kahoot and Mafia. Overall it was a very informative session where volunteers learned about the current and upcoming activities of VT Seva and were inspired by the spotlight and speaker series.

VT Seva Cary in collaboration with Carolina For The Kids successfully completed a Toy Drive. This drive was initiated by our youth volunteer Sowandarya Chivukula. She was assisted by Ishani Dasyam, Manasvi Gudibandi, Lasya Tula, Yashika Suraneni & Anish Yarlagadda. The drive ran for two weeks. Volunteers collected new toys from the homes of donors. All the toys that were collected through this drive were dropped off at UNC Children's hospital on April 9th, 2021. They will be going to the pediatric patients at the hospital. VT Seva Cary would like to thank all the donors and parents for their time & support!! Kudos to all the volunteers who participated in the toy drive!!

VT Seva Cary recently conducted their March Monthly Meeting. Youth volunteers discussed about some of the programs and got to witness beautiful and artistic talent from their peers. The session started off with a big welcome to the wave of new volunteers who joined VT Seva Cary this month. These volunteers were very enthusiastic and it was joyful to see the branch grow. This welcome was followed by a beautiful guitar performance by Sowndarya Chivukula. She played the very popular piece, “Für Elise,” composed by Beethoven. After this performance, Mahathi Mallela and Rohitha Sanka talked about “Feed a School” program being conducted by VT Seva. They explained about Netra Vidyala and Tribal schools in India being run by our organization. They educated the volunteers on the different ways they could provide food for the students in these schools. If you would like to celebrate your special occasions by donating to these schools, then please visit the below link to know more about the “Feed a School” program. https://www.vtsworld.org/specialoccasion Following this discussion, Nithya Janapati presented a fascinating showcase of her talent. She presented a collection of her eye-catching art and talked to the volunteers about how important it is to have a stress-relieving hobby. Finally, the volunteers played a short game of Kahoot, and the meeting concluded with an engaging VT Seva version of Jeopardy, created by Thanuj Desu. March month’s meeting was very exciting and informative to all the youth volunteers. We can’t wait for April month’s meeting!

On February 28th, VT Seva Cary youth board directed their first PVSA awards ceremony. This eventful session opened up with a blast of energetic words from our directors Kalyani Sanka and Sowjanya Thungathurti, and our amazing emcee and youth board President, Chandrika Changalvala. Then, Thanuj Desu and Ashrith Desu talked about the various activities VT Seva Cary has done so far in 2021. The ceremony started with some inspirational words from our guest speaker, Dawn Dixon. Dawn is the race coordinator at FSSeries, one of the many events our volunteers really enjoy volunteering at. She spoke of her experience on volunteering and service, and helping our volunteers learn how to branch out to gain more experience. Then, our advisor Chakradhar Sriperumbudur spoke about the PVSA awards and volunteerism. The PVSA Award winners were recognized after which they were asked to speak about their experience and journey that led them to this honorary award. Each volunteer gave incredible speeches that were very motivational to the audience. Then Ishani Dasyam introduced VT Seva Cary monthly spotlight performance by one of our very own youth volunteers, Bhaavita Nekkalapudi. Bhaavita gave an energetic performance by playing an improvised piece on the drums, in quite a unique circumstance, that left us all speechless. Finally, the volunteers ended the session on a fun note by playing a quick game of Kahoot, run by Rohitha Sanka, that was both engaging and entertaining. Needless to say, it was a very successful session, leaving all of our volunteers inspired and motivated. Chakradhar Sriperumbudur Kalyani Sanka Sowjanya Thungathurti Narsimha Tirunagari Aravind Ramanuja Dasan

A month’s effort of VT Seva Cary youth volunteers finally culminated with a donation at Western Wake Crisis Ministry in Apex yesterday, February 23rd, 2021. Karthikeya Dandu along with Aneesh Yarlagadda and Srini Tirunagari started a food drive with the intention of donating the proceeds to Western Wake Crisis Ministry. A great initiative during these tough times! Later, these kids were joined by Ashrith Desu, Ishani Dasyam, Akhil Dammalapati, Sribhaavita Nekkalapudi & Bharath Nekkalapudi. They prepared flyers and shared it in their respective communities and picked up donations from their neighbors, all the while maintaining strict Covid protocols. Together, they were able to collect and donate 175 pounds of food. This was possible due to the generosity of the donors. We would like to take this opportunity to thank each one of you who donated food for this drive!!! A huge shoutout to parents of these kids for extending their support and helping make this initiative a huge success! Kudos to all the kids who participated in this food drive, especially Karthikeya and Aneesh for such a thoughtful initiative!!

Today, VT Seva Cary youth volunteers received their PVSA awards. This year we had eight gold, one silver, and four bronze awards. Volunteers who received the awards are Ashrith Desu, Dhriti Koneru, Ishani Dasyam, Lakshmi Annugu, Mahathi Mallela, Manasvi Gudibandi, Monish Manne, Neeraja Boppana, Rohitha Sanka, Sribhaavita Nekkalapudi, Srichandrika Changalvala, Srinivas Tirunagari and Thanuj Desu. Hearty congratulations to these kids and thank you to their parents for their excellent support!! Chakradhar Sriperumbudur Kalyani Sanka Sowjanya Thungathurti Narsimha Tirunagari Aravind Ramanuja Dasan

This February, VT-Seva Cary planned something special to lighten up the days of members living in life care and assisted centers. Around 20 enthusiastic volunteers beautifully handcrafted Valentine’s Day cards with warm wishes and good health for the citizens living at Glenfora Living Assisted Center. Not only that but our volunteers also gracefully made cards ranging from the young to the old for the staff and people at Transitions LifeCare Center. They made 20 beautiful cards for the staff members and 25 cards for the people living there. At, VT-Seva Cary, we always strive to bring smiles to people’s faces during hard times like these and to encourage others to do the same.