More Than a Mentor: Helping a New Family Feel at Home in Columbus
When Emily Woody began looking for volunteer opportunities in Columbus early in 2025, she hoped to find one that aligned with her longstanding passion for childhood development and education. It was this pursuit that led her to CRIS’ youth mentorship program, Community Connectors (CC).
For the past year, Emily has served as a youth mentor through CC, where she was matched with a recently resettled family from Burundi with six school-aged children. She began visiting their home regularly to help with schoolwork, practice English, play games, and more. Since then, she has helped them navigate the everyday—like teaching the older children how to use their school email or figuring out what to do when the family’s power went out. The youngest mentee in the family, just six years old, has been practicing early literacy skills.
But beyond academic and everyday support, Emily has taken a deeper, more thoughtful approach to her role as a mentor.
“I am always thinking of things I liked to do as a kid,” she explains. “That’s what they should get to do.”
So, this past summer, she and the children did many of those things: visiting parks, playing games, going to COSI and Franklin Park Conservatory, playing mini golf, and watching movies together. Part of the fun of all these adventures? They ride COTA everywhere together. Along the way, each outing has become another opportunity to help the children learn a life skill while becoming more familiar and comfortable navigating their city.
Through these everyday experiences and adventures, Emily and her mentees have developed a strong bond. Emily made bracelets for all of the girls, and later overheard one of them showing off her bracelet to a friend.
“My sister made this for me,” the girl said, referring to Emily.
In another recent conversation, the oldest student in the family asked Emily, “You’ll come to my graduation, right?”
As Emily reflects on her experience volunteering with CRIS thus far, she is quick to point out that the relationship she and the family have developed is one of mutual growth and learning. They have taught her games from their home country, how to cook fufu (a staple in their region), and new ways of seeing and understanding the world. She describes their dynamic as “enriching and fulfilling.”
“The opportunity to see them each learn and experience all the new things that the United States has to offer has been the honor of a lifetime,” she adds.
This fall, Emily has taken her commitment to welcome and belonging one step further by participating as a fundraiser in the CRIS 5K.
Emily is one of more than 50 individuals fundraising for CRIS as we prepare for the 13th Annual CRIS 5K this Saturday, October 3. She and more than 400 others have also signed up to run, walk, and stand in solidarity with our refugee and immigrant neighbors on race day.
And there are plenty of reasons to join us this Saturday: the weather forecast looks good, the Buckeyes don’t play until 3:30, and we have a delicious lineup for this year’s post-race buffet. Also, for the first time in CRIS 5K history, we have a finisher’s medal for everyone who crosses the 5K finish line!
Join Emily and hundreds of our closest friends this Saturday. If you haven’t signed up yet, secure your spot today at crisohio.org/5K. Can’t make it? Check out our fundraisers’ page and donate to one of them!
Ultimately, that’s what Emily’s story is really about: showing up. Showing up for a family, for a community, and for the belief that everyone deserves the opportunity to feel welcome and at home.
It’s champions of welcome like Emily who continue to inspire us—and make our work possible.