Great Stories
Montana Campus Corps:
College Students Meeting Critical Community Needs
You know what they say about books and their covers? by Jordan Allen

When I turned in my application to volunteer at the Brain Injury Association of Montana (BIAMT), I only knew a few things about the organization. I knew that they were a non-profit that helped individuals that sustained brain injuries. Through my service at the BIAMT I learned a series of life lessons that I could not have learned anywhere else. The most important lesson I learned was simply that first impressions are rarely accurate and never helpful.
Most people do not know, but the Brain Injury Association of Montana’s office is tucked neatly away in a very generically inconspicuous structure that houses three other organizations of various causes. My first trip to BIAMT’s office would act as a fairly accurate predictor of what the rest of my service would be like.
In the first five minutes of being in the office I was introduced to the director of the program and sole employee. I was also introduced to a gentlemen named Tim. Tim was also a volunteer at the office.
Tim and I were assigned a task concerning mailings for a local event, and it took me less then a minute to realize that while I felt comfortable in the office, I had little idea what I was doing. In an effort to complete the task I asked Tim several questions about locations of various instruments required for the completion of our task. Upon my third round of quick-fire questions it became clear that Tim was becoming irritated.
“I can’t do this all on my own you know.” Tim responded agitatedly.
This outburst made me feel uncomfortable and unsure. Certainly, I was being irritating, but how was I to know where the envelopes were kept? His reaction had been quite uncalled for and unfair. Didn’t he know it wasn’t polite to snap at new volunteers? Wasn’t he aware that social norms dictated he hide is frustration?
However, the forwardness with which Tim had addressed me had little to do with his upbringing, poor or otherwise. Tim had sustained a severe traumatic brain injury a scant three years prior to our auspicious meeting in the office, and because of his injury Tim had difficulties with social interactions. Prior to his injury, Tim had been a student at a university back east studying engineering. An accidental fall from a tree retrieving a friend’s kite left Tim unalterably changed.
When I first learned of Tim’s injury, I felt a wave of shame and embarrassment for my unvoiced thoughts. As a student studying psychology, shouldn’t I have known better then to jump to conclusions? It was this moment that I decided to give up first impressions.
I know had I forgone volunteering at BIAMT, this life lesson would have passed me by. Had I met Tim on the street, I would have written him of as a jerk. However, after this experience and many others like it during my service, when a person defies a social norm I don’t automatically assume they are jerks. This insight given to me during my service was priceless.


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