CSX Beyond Our Rails

Utility & Social Media

A Q&A with Ted Marquis of City Year’s Care Force

a man in a white polo shirt with a City Year name tag speaks into the cameraView Photo

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For the past 12 years, Boston College’s Center for Corporate Citizenship has hosted a film festival competition, which provides companies with an opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to service and share the positive impact they are having on communities.

CSX, one of City Year’s National Leadership Sponsors and a longtime Care Force partner, has submitted a video featuring a service project, which took place at The Sanctuary in Jacksonville.

To learn more about the project and CSX’s partnership with Care Force, we conducted a Q&A with Ted Marquis, Vice President of Care Force.

Q: Why did the Sanctuary need the service that CSX and Care Force provided in this project?

A: It’s in the middle of an underserved neighborhood in Jacksonville, a couple miles from where CSX is headquartered. The local area has many of the challenges that inner city communities face across the country. It’s called The Sanctuary on 8th Street, and that’s really what it is. You have this building that is raising our children and helping them get to high school, graduate from high school, and many of them go off to college and lead good lives. They provide after school programming every day for up to 50 students, and give over 100 kids a safe place to be during the summer; kids who otherwise would have nowhere else to go.

Like many small, independent non-profits, there is a struggle to get funding for programs and facility upkeep. Without this CSX initiative, most of the physical improvements we made to The Sanctuary would not have happened.

Q: How would you describe CSX volunteers?

A: CSX volunteers are some of the hardest working volunteers you’ll find. They not only want to provide great service, but they want to leave behind a sustainable impact. They expect nothing but the highest quality of service of themselves, and they want to know that what they are doing is making a big difference.

Q: What made this project memorable for you?

A: It’s not often that I get the opportunity to work with an organization on five events over six months. What the multiple events and CSX’s investment of time and money allowed us to do is completely transform the space. Sometimes after a service event, we feel really good about the work we did but think we could have done more. With this project, we were able to work with hundreds of CSX employees to do everything that needed to be done to create a great environment for the children, and for the adults who are transforming their lives.

Q: How can you tell when a project like this one has made a big difference?

A: When we talk about transformation at Care Force, we talk about it in three ways.

First, what can you see that has changed? Whether it’s painting the walls, putting in new furniture, hanging children’s artwork, you can see the difference that is made. With this project, we did all these things, completely transforming the space.

Second, we strive to create and strengthen channels of social change. By launching this partnership, we hope to continue to drive CSX resources to foster a great environment for the children and help them go on to reach their full potential.

Third, how does our service alter the values, beliefs, self-image and behaviors of both those who serve and those who were served? All of the CSX volunteers who participated in this project were part of the CSX Management Trainee Program, so they will go on to be leaders in their company. In the long term, this service experience will impact how they see service as part of their work at CSX and they will lead knowing good citizenship means good business.

Q: What is your experience serving with CSX?

A: Since 2004, City Year’s Care Force has engaged more than 6,000 CSX employees and key stakeholders in over 50 community service events. They are one of the great Care Force partnerships; and it’s a partnership in the truest sense of the word. We always ask ourselves, how can we work together, based on our shared values to make a difference in the communities where we both live and work? How can we leverage what each of us does best to create sustainable, lasting change?

Like what you see?
You can view the video here and cast your vote at the BCCCC website.

Voting is open through March 3, 2012. The winner of the Film Festival will be announced at the 2012 International Corporate Citizenship Conference, March 25–27, in Phoenix, AZ.

Related Photos from the Gallery View Others

  • several children raise hands in front of a purple painted wall
  • three volunteers in blue t-shirts paint a red brick wall purple with a “Hope Happens Here” door in the middle
  • Sanctuary on 8th logo
  • a woman in a white shirt speaks into a microphone
  • a man gives the thumbs up next to a smiling woman with a paint brush
  • a large team of volunteers pose in front of playground equipment
  • a man with a paintbrush, blue glove, and hat paint the inside of a railing
  • two volunteers rake and tend to groundwork
  • a volunteer paints green and red stick figures on a dumpster
  • a volunteer paints “Hope Happens Here” on a building door
  • two rows of volunteers pose together on a basketball blacktop
  • a smiling man holds a coffee with another woman
  • several volunteers working on patching grass with shovels
  • a smiling student with a paint-stained t-shirt
  • three men shovel top soil in a wheelbarrow while another man uses a hose to spray in water
  • five volunteers in blue t-shirts redo a red brick wall in a fresh coat of purple paint
  • two volunteers paint an “Effort and Courage” sign
  • a family of three volunteers stand shoulder to shoulder in front of palm trees
  • volunteers paint a large map of the United States on blacktop
  • six volunteers stand shoulder to shoulder underneath tree cover
  • a volunteer in a blue t-shirt paints a white striped line on blacktop
  • a crowd of volunteers, mostly in light blue t-shirts, stand together on a blacktop
  • a ring of volunteers join hands for a spirit break
  • five men in light blue “I AM CSX” brace the plastic frame of a structure
  • a man wearing safety googles and gloves cuts a playground border using a buzzsaw
  • a volunteer on a ladder paints the interior of a room blue and green
  • several volunteers spread mulch in a playground area
  • a very large team of volunteers pose on the blacktop
  • two volunteers work to assemble a wooden box