SCA Alum ’99-’03, ’08, ’09
Name: Monique Dailey
Hometown: Washington DC
School: Mary Baldwin College in Staunton, VA
Occupation: DC Area Youth Programs Manager for SCA
SCA: DC Community Programs ’99-’03, Idaho National Crew ’03, ’08 Crew Leader, ’09 Urban Tree House Intern
Monique began her career with SCA in high school as a DC Community Programs member, going on to the Junior Ranger program in Rock Creek Park and eventually participating in a National Crew at Salmon Challis National Forest in Idaho. After college and a few years of globe-trotting (just Peace Corps in the Philippines, nbd) she returned to DC to run the very SCA program she’d started in. Get the whole amazing story below in an essay she wrote for the Huffington Post in September of last year.
The Power of Washington’s Open Park Spaces: SCA’s Community Programs at Work
Growing up in the Petworth section of the District of Columbia, I was 10 years old before I saw my first real park. I didn’t realize at the time that it would be my salvation from the drugs and violence that were ravaging my community. It would have been preposterous then to think that within 16 years I would be running youth programs in parks throughout the metropolitan area — and offering the same extraordinary opportunities that I had to countless others.
The defining moment for me came in the form of a neighbor who regularly walked her dog and who one day asked if I and several friends wanted to walk with her to Rock Creek Park. We knew her well, because of her dog, and, while it was not a short walk, we readily accepted. When she saw how much we enjoyed the park, she began researching programs that would enable us to spend time there…Head to Huffington Post to keep reading.
