Christian Valerio

Christian Valerio started with Students of Service (SOS) as a volunteer around San Antonio, at the San Antonio Diaper Bank and the Food Bank, and making packages for military members overseas. In this alumni story for the San Antonio youth nonprofit, he looks back at what SOS made possible.

An SOS scholarship sent him on a trip abroad. “Standing on the Great Wall of China helped me realize that there is such another world out there that is a lot farther than just the end of my street,” he says. He credits SOS with the confidence to apply to the University of Notre Dame, and he got in.

He’s part of the first generation of his family to grow up in the United States, and he was raised to give back. He joined the SOS board as its first alumni liaison.

It’s one of five shorter videos that came from the same shoots as the SOS about-us video, Organization Overview.