Kyri Murdough

B.A., Community Justice and Policy Studies, 2006

Tutor Training Coordinator

North Carolina Campus Compact

Americorps*VISTA

Guilford College

“I was a 10-year-old girl living in Ithaca, N.Y., when I first announced that I would be going to Guilford College,” says Kyri Murdough. How did she know? “A young woman who was a long-time family friend as I was growing up, she went to Guilford. Then she joined the Peace Corps and served in Ethiopia. Where else would I go to college after seeing all that?”

In fact, young Kyri’s community service commitment began very early. “I was raised a Quaker, and my community service began with my mom — she had me working in soup kitchens since I can remember. We were always doing things for the community. I was active in Quaker youth groups, with a focus on service. “

Indeed. As a teen, Kyri went to Mississippi on a blitz-build with Habitat for Humanity, building a complete house in a total of 10 days. She also went to San Francisco for Habitat. In fact, she worked so tirelessly to help those in need that in 2002 she was awarded the New York State Governor’s Award for Community Service. That award included a free laptop computer, so “I was set for college!” she says.

Now Kyri has followed her babysitter’s footsteps — she has successfully attended and graduated from Guilford College, and she’s serving in what has been called the domestic Peace Corps, AmericaCorps*VISTA (the acronym stands for Volunteers in Service to America).

AmeriCorps*VISTA members spend at least one year in full-time service helping people in low-income communities. All of the organization’s projects focus on building permanent infrastructure in nonprofit organizations to help them bring individuals and communities out of poverty.

Kyri was happy to land her current assignment because it allows her to build upon the work she had done while a student at Guilford College — working with people in prison, with the homeless, with refugees from Vietnam and the Sudan, with veterans … and all in the community of Greensboro that she has embraced.

“In my junior year at Guilford, it all really came together,” Kyri says. “I mean it just clicked. My community service and my class work merged. It was amazing — it all made so much sense.”

Here’s how it happened: “I was taking one class in particular, Understanding Systems of Oppression, and the class clarified and defined all the work I had been doing with the prison system and antiracism and caucusing and all the rest. Best of all, I then realized that without any doubt, my #1 love in life is service.”

Kyri has a younger sister who is in her freshman year of college, so Kyri has advice ready for those who are looking for the right school: “If you want to go to a college that offers huge classes — you know, so large that you can skip the class and not get caught — don’t even consider Guilford. At Guilford College, the classes are small. You sit in a circle and participate in discussions. You call the professors by their first names. They know you, the staff members know you, the administrators know you.”

In fact, she says, “It’s that kind of personal relationship that makes the academically challenging nature of Guilford not seem intimidating. You’re a person there, not a number, and if you need help, it’s waiting for you.”

Even if you do choose Guilford, she has specific advice: “This is a place that lets you explore, lets you discover what you really want to spend your life doing. It’s so wonderful that you’re encouraged to find out who you really are at your core, so you can pursue that as a vocation and not just graduate to a job.”

Guilford College touches the entire community, says Kyri: “There is a Guilford College bubble, of course, but you’re encouraged to go and work outside that zone. I can tell you this — community service in the Greensboro area made me the person who walked across the stage to get her diploma.”

She maintains that, “Guilford College offers so many clubs and organizations and classes and majors, that if you take advantage of it — and you must be the one to do the work — Guilford College will make you into an incredibly well-rounded person. What more would you want?”

Did her sister listen to Kyri’s advice and decide to attend Guilford College? Absolutely.