By Dan Sullivan
Catholic Herald

Students give helping hand to shelter

LADYSMITH--Throughout their school year students' education at Our Lady of Sorrows School in Ladysmith extended beyond reading, writing and arithmetic. Besides these core subjects, the young people participated in a variety of service projects.

Tami Stewart, principal at the school, said this service component is an important part of Catholic education.

"We do it at every grade level," Stewart said. "It's good for the kids to learn to do things for someone without getting anything back. Some of the projects reach out into the community, some of them reach out in the school or the parish, but on a whole, it's been a good thing."

The tasks included: first graders picking up litter in a community park; second grade students collecting pop tabs for the Ronald McDonald House; children in the third grade making cookbooks for their prayer partners; fourth graders assisting kindergartners; fifth graders helping less fortunate children; seventh graders helping wash the school's lunch trays, and eighth graders purchasing baby items for Pregnancy Resource Center in Ladysmith.

For extending a helping hand to Ladymith's Time-Out Family Abuse Shelter the students in Darlene Sieg's sixth grade class received a certificate of appreciation from the shelter. "Students brought in items and donated them to the shelter," Sieg said.

The youngsters, however, didn't just ask their parents for a handout in order to obtain the funds to purchase these items. "I asked them to work for it," Sieg said. "They were small items that the kids were able to afford -- like toothpaste, glass cleaner and paper towels. This way they could really feel that they had a part in it."

Nick Hebard and Ashley Zahurones were just two students who were glad they could extend a helping hand to those in need. "It feels good to help other people that have been hurt," Hebard said

Zahurones added, "I feel happy that I am helping people that don't have the things that we have. We bought little things that we take for granted. It made me realize that we have more things that we should be thankful for."

Lynne Stanger, executive director, of the shelter, said the students donations meant a lot to the shelter. "Considering we are a nonprofit (agency), any support is greatly appreciated," Stanger said. "It's also inspiring that these kids are learning that domestic violence is an issue in our community. They also learn community support and how they can give back to their community. The reality of it is, without community support, our program couldn't continue."

Besides class projects, the entire student body was involved in an annual diabetes fund-raising walk, gathered canned food at Thanksgiving and collected funds for the Holy Childhood Association.

< Local Archives

© Superior Catholic Herald, 2004