KANSAS CITY, Mo. — For City Year's 8th annual Martin Luther King Jr. National Day of Service event, they brought out the pros and the amateurs.
"With my talents being an artist, a designer, I'm absolutely excited about being able to paint for people and show off my talents and do something that you know, serves a community like MLK served everybody, trying to bring everyone together," said Phil Shafer, an artist.
Shafer is a local artist who has been working with City Year for a long time. City Year is a nonprofit organization focused on helping students stay on track to graduate through mentorship and tutoring.
"I'm so glad that they put them into our schools because as a student, it was hard for me to learn. It was hard for me to comprehend some stuff, so when I had the City Year's with me, they helped me understand with tutoring," said Aliecia Brown, a junior at Central High School. "They made me feel like I belong, and they made me motivated, so I'm very happy to have them in our schools."
At Monday's day of service, over 100 volunteers helped paint 22 murals at Central Middle School including former Kansas City Chiefs and Royals players.
"When they come back to school tomorrow, I mean it's going to look like a totally different school," said Al Fitzmorris, former Kansas City Royals pitcher.
Fitzmorris was getting his hands dirty and so was former Chiefs wide receiver Tim Barnett.
"He's a better painter, I'm a better golfer, he throws a baseball a little faster and little harder, and I can catch a football a little better than he does," Barnett said.
The pair were poking fun at each other while having fun giving back to the community.
"We encourage other people that aren't doing anything — don't just take this day as a day off to rest and do nothing, go out and do something, give back to someone," Barnett said.
Looking around at the different murals, volunteers hope they encourage students to do many things.
"I think their reactions are going to be a lot of jaw dropping," Shafer said. "What I hope is that people discover things over the time. Like, they might see a mural and then be like, man I really love this one, but then they'll turn around and see a quote on the wall that they hadn't read before and that would be inspiring."
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