One Year, A Lifetime of Impact
Former City Year mentor Nimisha recently spoke at our event with ServiceNow, reflecting on her year of service with City Year UK a decade ago. She shared how transformative the experience was and how it helped shape her career path, highlighting the lasting impact of investing in young people. Read her story below.
I’m Nimisha, a Service Designer at Virgin Media O2, and ten years ago I spent a year serving with City Year at Surrey Square Primary School.
What first drew me to City Year was a moment of clarity I experienced just beforehand. I had recently completed the International Citizen Service programme, spending three months volunteering in Senegal, West Africa. It was there that I witnessed, for the first time, what meaningful social impact truly looks like — something lived and felt by the communities we worked alongside.
I grew up with stability: a strong support system, encouragement and access to opportunities that shaped my path. Through my volunteering, I became aware that these foundations are not universal. When I read about what it meant to wear the red jacket with City Year and what it symbolised — commitment, resilience, unity and the belief that every child deserves the chance to thrive — I felt an immediate alignment. This wasn’t charity! It was a chance to stand in the gap, learn what leadership, accountability and impact really mean, and most importantly show up every single day for young people who needed consistency the most.
That year changed me!
I developed skills that I still draw on every day in my currently role. It deepened my empathy — not as a soft skill, but as a discipline of truly listening and understanding the realities behind behaviour. It tested and strengthened my resilience, with 5am starts and a near two-hour commute each way requiring real commitment and consistency, even on the toughest of days.
I remember a student I worked with —we’ll call him Leo. Bright, full of energy, clearly full of potential, but he was known for having a short fuse. During our one-to-one sessions, we’d just talk about his day. Nothing formal, just space to be heard.
One afternoon, I asked what he’d had for dinner the night before. “Just porridge,” he said. I asked about breakfast. “Nothing.” I also knew he rushed his lunch most days so he could get to the football pitch as quickly as possible. And in that moment, it clicked — perhaps what we were interpreting as anger was actually hunger.
Because of those consistent one-to-ones, we were able to understand what sat behind the behaviour. We encouraged him to join breakfast club, making sure he started the day right and the change was tangible. He was more focused, more settled and better able to regulate his emotions. His potential was always there. What changed was the support around him.
This also opened my eyes to how interconnected systems really are — how schools, families, communities and policy environments overlap and influence outcomes in ways that aren’t always visible at first glance. That awareness of interdependency now underpins my work as a service designer, where designing effective services means truly understanding the people we are designing for, and recognising that meaningful change requires the whole system to be considered.
I learnt that strong teams are built on trust, shared purpose and clear communication — especially when emotions are running high and you’re having a tearful moment in the staff room. It was the strength of teamwork that picked me up and encouraged me to turn up day after day. From this experience I have carried the belief that the best outcomes come when people feel supported, aligned and accountable to one another — something I am proud to embed within the team I am part of today.
During my year of service, I was incredibly fortunate to have such a great corporate mentor — a Bridge Builder — who supported me in achieving my personal and professional development goals. He even won the Bridge Builder Award the year I served. He invested time in building my confidence and opened up networks I hadn’t previously had access to. His belief in my potential expanded what I believed was possible for myself.
At the same time, the resilience I built during my service became the foundation for my own career journey. That same determination carried me through to transitioning into a design discipline — something I had been working towards for 11 years.
A few months ago, ten years on, a team member of mine messaged our team to ask if we would be interested in attending an alumni event — and we all turned up. That’s the power of shared purpose and community. As City Year alumni we care, we deliver and we show up.
When you invest in City Year UK, you are investing in:
- Children who need consistent, trusted adults in their lives.
- Young leaders who will go on to shape organisations, industries and communities.
- A multiplier effect that stretches far beyond one academic year.
I wore the red jacket for one year, but the impact of that year has lasted a lifetime.
