On Thursday, May 21, freshman Mikyla Sobczak was not spending her half-day at home like most Morgan students—rather, she could be found with her hands pressed against a glass enclosure, staring at a penguin passerby. Sobczak was not the only Morgan student who found themselves at Mystic Aquarium that afternoon; she was part of over a dozen Clinton Police Youth Group students that participated in one of the group’s several yearly trips.
Sobczak had joined the Youth Group at the start of her first year at Morgan after hearing positive feedback about it from friends. “I stayed in the Youth Group because I wanted to do something where I could do community service,” she said. “But after the first fundraiser, I also stayed because I was having fun.”
The group, which meets whenever a new event is being discussed or an event is taking place, is advised by Officer Corbin. He has been part of the Youth Group since 2018, one year after its creation, and has witnessed the growth and progression of the group. “When we started in 2017, we targeted more at-risk youth,” said Officer Corbin. “But we wanted it open to everybody, and we wanted people from all different backgrounds who can support some of those kids that are more at-risk.” Once he opened it to all types of students, the group became even more successful in its events and activities.
The Youth Group’s events range from a food drive at Big Y to a trip to Dave and Buster’s; they do volunteer work as well as fun events for the students, both inside and outside the walls of Morgan. Sobczak noted that these events, including the trip to Mystic, are done to help bring the students of the Youth Group together and give them a sense of community and purpose. She found herself feeling closer to her peers and her community when she joined, and with each event, she found herself growing closer to her police department. Sobczak always saw police officers as people she could go to for assistance, but noted that the Youth Group helped strengthen this feeling of trust.
The bus heading to Mystic Aquarium left Morgan at 12pm, giving Sobczak and the group nearly two hours to visit the aquatic life. They then headed to Old Mystic Village, which the bus departed from at around 3pm to get the students back at around 4pm. “We went to Mangos Pizza, and we were able to walk around the village a little bit,” said Sobczak. She found the event to be a very fun experience and expressed her gratitude for being able to be a part of the group.
“We’ve never been to Mystic before,” noted Officer Corbin, which was one of the factors that caused him to select the aquarium as the destination for the trip. When he asked the students of the Youth Group for their opinions on where to go, Mystic was a highly popular destination. “A lot of people raised their hand for that idea.”
The Clinton Police Youth Group not only holds events for the benefit of the students involved but for the good of the community, too. Earlier in the year, around a dozen students stood in the Clinton Big Y parking lot, collecting donations and non-perishables for the soup kitchen. The autism sensory bags, put together by the Youth Group, were made with the goal that they might be able to help someone in the community feel safe and calm in a time of need, and were given to those who needed them. The Youth Group aspires to better the community and the lives of those within it.
“I think it’s a really great group of people,” Sobczak said, describing the Youth Group. While the students involved get community service hours for some of the events they take part in, Sobczak noted that she would still take part even if this wasn’t true. “We do fun stuff, but we also help out the community.”
Reasons such as this cause the Youth Group to be as close-knit and as pleasurable as it is today. “I have some students in the youth group that this is their event. They can take ownership of this,” said Officer Corbin. He does his best to ensure that any gathering or event held is a pleasant experience for anyone who takes part, and tries to show everyone that the police department is a force made to help students. “It helps us bridge the gap with students and their police department. We built that trust,” he explained. “We build positive relationships.”
“We’re not all best friends, but we know each other enough to feel comfortable and have fun with one another,” said Sobczak. When she was eating Mangos Pizza, laughing with her peers, she felt like she was part of a group. When she was walking the length of the aquarium and wandering the streets of Old Mystic Village, she felt like she was part of a community. “That’s what’s so great about the Youth Group. You meet new people and you bond with new people… It’s a fun thing to take your mind off of things and let yourself go,” said Sobczak.
