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| Iraqi youth and their parents gather outside of what is now the Maghrib Youth Center in Baghdad, led by the efforts of 1st Lt. Corbin Sawyer with the Alaska National Guard. |
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Rebuilding War-Torn Communities
Club Alumnus Fills Overseas Need
When 1st Lt. Corbin Sawyer of the Alaska National Guard was sent to Baghdad in April 2003 to work as an intelligence officer, the last thing he thought he'd be doing was setting up a Boys & Girls Club. But after discovering an empty building surrounded by debris, the former Club member knew he needed to take action.
Saddened by the fact that young Iraqis living inside a walled compound had no safe place to play outside, the former Club member organized his own troops to turn the empty building into a youth center. With seed money from the U.S. Army, the idea was met with abundant enthusiasm. Soon a community of American troops, Iraqi children and their parents came together to build what is today the Maghrib Youth Center, currently serving 400 kids.
Now stationed back home and working as a financial analyst, Sawyer says his biggest reward was not just witnessing what happened to the kids, but seeing the transformation in their mothers.
"Watching the moms bring their children to the youth center really hit home," says Sawyer. "Kids are fearless. We would see them all the time because they had nothing to do but run around in dangerous areas – sometimes looting and doing things they shouldn't be doing out of boredom. But we never saw the moms because they were scared to come out, scared for themselves and for their kids. The fact that they felt the center was a safe place was very telling."
The success of the Maghrib Youth Center has been so tremendous that 12 additional youth centers modeled after this one are now being built in Iraq.
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