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Miami Palmetto High School senior Tyler Shapiro has logged more than 800 community service hours. Many of those hours came from volunteering at the Mini-Canes Summer Camp at the University of Miami.
She attended that camp for eight years and loved it so much, she wanted to work there as a program aide.
The camp is held at the UM Wellness Center.
“We have to keep them quiet and respectful of the public,” she says. “We make sure they clean up their own mess and not leave it for us.”
There is a sport of the week, they go to the basketball courts, play capture the flag, and do other fun things, but they also learn sportsmanship and how to get along with others. They help the children with their fine motor skills. They have a skills test at the end of the week.
Shapiro loves working with children. One child last year was having a difficult time and she made sure to keep an eye on him, helping him learn how to dribble a basketball and that he was okay in the pool. She also made sure he wasn’t ostracized.
Another child was having difficulty leaving her mom. Shapiro went over to reassure her and introduced the little girl to other children.
“She ended up making friends and enjoying the camp,” Shapiro says.
She usually works all eight weeks of the camp but this past summer, she cut her volunteering short so she could attend a class at Duke University.
“We got to study human brains and animal brains,” she says. “I found it interesting. I’ve always, since I was little, wanted to be a pediatrician. I have always had a thing for science.”
She took Advanced Placement Psychology and found the information about the brain fascinating.
“I called my mom the first day of class at Duke and I was in happy tears because the class was everything I wanted it to be,” she says.
Whether she will switch to a neurology major or keep with her plan of being a pediatrician is still up in the air.
She’s applying to Duke, the University of North Carolina, Washington University in St. Louis, Stanford, Emory, and Wake Forest, New York University and Tulane.
“I was thinking about double majoring in Humanities and Neuroscience, or a major in Neuroscience and minor in the Humanities,” she says.
Outside of school, she’s a part of Volunteering Miami.
“I started my own project called Happy Hearts,” she says.
She partnered with several clubs to collect toys and books. She distributed them to children with cancer at Nicklaus Children’s Hospital.
“When I donated the first round of books, it was really nice to see the smiles,” she says.
She’s working on the third collection drive now so she can make another round of donations before Thanksgiving or Christmas.
Shapiro is a member of the Student Council. Last year she was the person in charge of the clubs. This year she’s an EESAC representative.
She’s a board member for the National Honor Society, and secretary of FFEA.
Last year, she was a teacher aide for the chemistry teacher. She graded papers but also helped the teacher with the class. She made sure the students knew when quizzes and tests were coming up by reminding them on Instagram. Those reminders worked and grades went up in the class.
Shapiro is in the Top 25 for math students which made her eligible for the Girls Are for STEM program at UM that she’s taking this year.
This school year she’s doing an internship at a pediatrician’s office.
Linda Rodriguez Bernfeld
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