Amy Parodi grew up in a pleasant suburb south of Seattle, went to college in Texas to get her teaching degree, then came right back to the same community to teach high school English.
It was an agreeable life for a young adult. But beginning schoolteachers don’t make much, so Parodi took on some freelance copywriting jobs to earn a little extra cash on the side.
One of those was an assignment for World Vision, the humanitarian relief organization headquartered in her hometown of Federal Way, Washington. Parodi was asked to help get out the word about the AIDS crisis in Africa.
“I had been clueless about what was going on, and I learned so much!” she says now. “As much as I loved teaching, I’d never felt like I was using my skills to do something so meaningful.”
At the end of 2002, World Vision hired her on full time, and less than a month later she was traveling to the Middle East with an advance team to prepare for the impact of the looming Second Gulf War.
This was the first of several such trips to different hot spots around the globe. But more than a decade later, as World Vision’s public relations director, she now spends most of her time at the organization’s headquarters.
“It really hasn’t changed how exciting this work is. Even though I’m not on a plane and seeing it all myself, it’s still so compelling. I know what’s going on in the world and I know how to help… and how to get other people to help.”
Much of her work currently is focused on World Vision’s relief work in the Syrian crisis. “It’s robust and complex work,” she says. “We’re serving thousands and thousands of refugees.”
Parodi is not just making her mark, she’s making a difference.
Barbara Lloyd McMichael is our ground reporter in South King County, Wash., and author of the syndicated book review column “The Bookmonger.”
From South King County, Wash.:
From teaching to humanitarian relief
by Barbara Lloyd McMichael