Local Teens Honored for Community Service

Recently, the Teens Make A Difference Awards Ceremony took place at Inland Center Mall. The ceremony recognized local high school students for their outstanding volunteer service at community places such as libraries, hospitals, schools, nonprofits and community based organizations. A total of 53,982 hours of service were volunteered by 976 high school students from 10 schools in the past year. All students with 25 hours or more were recognized with awards and received a goody-bag filled with fun items donated by Arrowhead, Inland Empire United Way and Inland Center stores. The top student with the most hours volunteered was Brooke Vigil from Redlands East Valley High School who won the “Top Dawg” Award for volunteering 483 hours. The Top School Award went to Rialto High School for volunteering over 10,861 hours. The value of a volunteer service hour is $24.75 as determined by the Independent Sector. Therefore, a contribution valued at $1,336,054 has been donated to our community. “The ‘Teens Make a Difference Awards’ ceremony was created by Inland Center Mall to encourage high school teens to volunteer in their communities and has grown from 35 students to 976! This program has helped thousands of high school students recognize the value of volunteering and helps them to become better students and community leaders,” said Terri Relf, Senior Marketing Manager at Inland Center Mall. “We are so proud to be recognizing all the wonderful students who give so much of their time to these worthwhile causes. They are all to be commended and applauded!” Communities that have benefited from volunteer hours performed by the students are: Colton, Grand Terrace, Highland, Loma Linda, Redlands, Rialto and San Bernardino. “We are extremely pleased to recognize the high school students who unselfishly volunteer throughout the year, but we know they don’t volunteer to receive the recognition. One teen expressed it well when he said that volunteering builds character, self-esteem and is a terrific learning experience. Not to mention a blast!” proclaimed Doug Rowand, President of Arrowhead United Way. “Raising up young people today who will become tomorrow’s leaders and value giving back to our community is critical to the future of the Inland Empire,” stated Gregory Bradbard, Inland Empire United Way CEO. “It is our pleasure investing in youth through the Teens Make A Difference program.” Since the inception of the awards ceremony in 1993, we have recorded a total number of 10,878 volunteers completing 1,158,924.53 hours. This is a program of Inland Center Mall, Arrowhead United Way’s Volunteers United program and Inland Empire United Way’s Volunteer Initiative, Hands On Inland Empire. For more information regarding this event and others similar to it, call Inland Center Mall at 909-884-7268 or log on to the mall’s website at www.inlandcenter.com.