The head of business development at Zadok, Tory, is exactly the sort of Type A person you’d want to hire for such a position. Intelligent and driven, she is always running around the store going a thousand miles per hour.
Tory also manages to squeeze in being a board member of the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Houston Young Professionals Organization on top of doing the work of three people on a daily basis and, you know, having a life and stuff.
So it was of no surprise, recently, when I heard from my desk the excited ooh’s and ahh’s of a group of kids from one of the Houston clubs learning how to use the steamer. They were visiting us on an after-school field trip and were having a blast taking a tour of the store.
The Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Houston support at-risk Houston youth by offering after-school and summer programs aimed at kids who don’t always have a stable home life. Some of these kids stopped by Zadok so that they could learn about what working at a jewelry store is like. They absolutely loved it! (Can you blame them? They got to see a pair of Sutra earrings Cardi B actually wore.) As a result, Tory and I decided we would head to one of the clubs during the kids’ Spring Break to give them a gemstone class.
Have you ever tried to keep a roomful of middle school-aged kids engaged in an educational presentation? Have you done it while there’s a water balloon fight going on outside? It was probably like science class vs. summer camp to them. Fortunately, they found gemology pretty interesting. The questions they asked during the GIA GemKids birthstone slideshow I presented were pretty great. “Where do diamonds come from?” and “Are ruby and sapphire the same thing?” were couple of my favorites. Ruby and sapphire are actually the same thing (corundum), but most adults don’t even know that! It’s always exciting when someone shows interest in what you’re passionate about. The kids truly seemed to have a great time, and some of them may even remember what their birthstone is.
After the presentation, I helped the kids get a closer look at the stones we’d brought. For most, it was their first time using a microscope. We used a GIA Presentationscope. They got a kick out of being able to see diamonds, emeralds, opals and more in such detail.
It was a great way to spend an afternoon.
For information about how to volunteer with the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Houston, click here.