This winter at Providence Academy, students have had the opportunity to be a part of many service projects.
First, the Upper School hosted its annual Red Cross Blood Drive, which was organized by Isabella Halek ’17. Students could donate blood if they were 16 years of age or older, and a big number of students were generous enough to help the community.
Marty Partoll ’17, donated blood. “I was really excited to donate blood because I got to help lots of people. We got some cool stickers too,” said Marty.
Also, the Upper School held a Mitten Drive with all the proceeds going to Sharing and Caring Hands.
Gabby Munger ’19, a student council representative, said, “We wanted to do a mitten tree because we remembered how much fun it was in lower school, and we wanted to do a service project during advent.”
Next, the Middle School held a bake sale which was sponsored by the Middle School Student Council. All of the proceeds went to Interfaith Outreach, a nonprofit organization that helps people in the nearby community. The school’s generosity helped raise $600. Also Middle School students could bring in different items that went to Simpson Housing in Minneapolis. 6th graders were supposed to bring in baby items, such as diapers, baby blankets, and baby socks. 7th graders brought in new items for women, including hair brushes, bath towels, and toothpaste. Finally, 8th graders donated items for men, like shaving cream, t-shirts, and socks.
Lastly, the Lower School held a toy drive.
Mrs. Galgano, the Lower School Director, said, “We are collecting toys right now for the children at Sharing and Caring Hands.”
Students can bring in new toys and place them under the Christmas tree in the Great Room. It is a fun and easy way to help people in the community have a great Christmas.
As an ongoing tradition at Providence Academy, the students in the Lower School are also collecting mittens and gloves for the children at Sabathani Center. They can bring these mittens and hats (sometimes students will even bring winter jackets and snow pants) to the Christmas tree in the library, where the items are collected for donation.
Outside of school, students can organize their own service projects. Riley Nechanicky ’19 and I organized a Sleep Out, where we slept outside in a tent to raise awareness for homelessness in our community. When we went to bed, it was about 30 degrees and lightly snowing, but when we woke up, our tent was covered in snow! We invited a few of our friends to sleep out with us, and we raised money by emailing our family and friends asking them to donate. All of the proceeds from the Sleep Out went to Interfaith Outreach,
If you love to help others, Providence Academy is a great place to do so because there are so many different opportunities for service.
This article was really well written and I am amazed that they slept out all night to raise awareness.
It was so fun organizing the sleep out with you, great article!