Gap year working at Grinnell is where ‘everything began to fall into place’
April 08, 2025 — A few days a week, Wabeskesiga picks up a Grinnell College van and drives a group of students south and west of town to the Poweshiek Animal League Shelter (PALS).
Almost a year ago, Sophia Estrada Snow – known by her Meskwaki name of Wabeskesiga – opted to take a gap year following her first year at Drake University. Over the summer, she became aware of an open AmeriCorps member position at the Grinnell College Center for Careers, Life, and Service’s (CLS) Civic Education and Innovation office, headed by Associate Dean and Executive Director of Civic Education & Innovation Susan Leathem Sanning.
Wabeskesiga applied and started last August. As the first AmeriCorps member working in the office since the COVID-19 pandemic began, she’s hit the ground running.
Wabeskesiga, left, and Associate Dean Susan Leathem Sanning have their photo taken at the Civic Action Academy.
The Civic Education and Innovation office originated with a student initiative put forward in the early 2010s by then Student Government Association Vice President of Academic Affairs Wadzi Motsi ’12. “The idea behind my position was to have someone who focused on helping students build the mindsets and skills necessary to leverage their education in service of the common good,” Sanning says.
After some institutional reorganization and strategic initiatives, Sanning and the office she leads came to reside in what is now the CLS. While the Civic Education and Innovation’s work has many responsibilities and dimensions, supporting student volunteer efforts is a significant one.
Through the work of full-time staff and past AmeriCorps members like Carina Wilson ’19 and Guinevere Wallace Natarelli (who now works as associate director of alumni and donor relations for reunion programs), the office has opened the door for students on campus to identify opportunities to get more involved in community engagement work. Natarelli, for example, developed the Community Partner Search, which allows students, staff, and faculty to learn about and connect with community organizations across Iowa.
Wabeskesiga gives a presentation at the Seed Coalition’s Civic Action Academy in fall 2024.
Wabeskesiga is piloting a few more targeted and formalized student volunteer programs by recruiting, mentoring, and coordinating the day-to-day logistics. The end goal is to help students feel more comfortable volunteering in the community by making opportunities more seamless and providing on-site mentored support to the students. This allows students who might not otherwise feel comfortable volunteering in Grinnell a safer way to do so. Over time new, sometimes unexpected, leaders emerge who are then offered support as the project transitions into student hands.
As a recent student herself, Wabeskesiga approaches this work as a peer who understands the demands on and day-to-day life of a college student. “We’re learning different things every day,” she says. “I let the students know that this isn’t something that should make their days harder. This is an outlet to do good work that’s hands-on and can get your mind off your schoolwork.”
PALS is just one of the organizations that Wabeskesiga’s work has supported, but it’s particularly close to her heart. As far back as middle school, she recalls, she wanted to be a veterinarian. While some aspects of veterinary medicine began to be less appealing as she got older, Wabeskesiga still gravitates toward animals and particularly training service and therapy animals.
Wabeskesiga meets with Leslie Arredondo ’28 at the CLS.
As a no-kill animal shelter that operates entirely on private donations and quite heavily on volunteers, PALS and the wider community have benefited from the regular contingent of student volunteers. While students last semester primarily supported dogs at PALS, after a student request, supporting cats is now an option, too. Wabeskesiga is currently reviewing applications for a second cohort of students to expand the overall number of students volunteering there.
While there’s an immediate, day-to-day dimension of volunteering at an organization like PALS, there’s also the possibility of sowing long-term community engagement and connection. Student volunteers are “building relationships with animals, fellow students, and community members who work and volunteer at PALS,” Sanning points out.
Recently, she saw a former PALS student volunteer, Em Huss-Lederman ’24, recognize one of their favorite PALS dogs, Neko, while visiting the John Chrystal Center. Huss-Lederman knew Neko, but didn’t know that Sarah Barks had adopted the dog. Barks also works in the CLS as senior director, STEM Career Communities & Analytics. Through Neko, Huss-Lederman and Barks were now connected. Sanning sees the possibilities of fostering meaningful connections on campus, in town, and across Iowa in interactions like that.
Isaac McCollum ’28, left, Helen LaPointe ’27, Lohla Yarolimek ’27, Rosemary Beltran ’28, and Em Huss-Lederman ’24 walk dogs near PALS. Huss-Lederman is walking Neko.
Wabeskesiga has also been building on meaningful connections while opening herself up to new possibilities. She grew up close by in the Meskwaki Nation and visited campus often with her mother, Aditea ’03 (Stephanie BadSoldier Snow) so working as an AmeriCorps member at Grinnell has been like “coming full circle,” she says.
Her work this academic year coupled with experiences like presenting to students from across Iowa and Minnesota at the Seed Coalition’s Civic Action Academy last fall have “changed my mind about my career path,” she says. Wabeskesiga plans to pursue community engagement work long after her AmeriCorps appointment comes to an end.
“This position has given me new skills, knowledge, and freedoms,” she says. “Everything began to fall into place.”
—by Joe Engleman ’14