Packing bags of food at Sacred Heart of San Jose are St. Andrew's eighth-graders (from left) Carolyn Armstrong, Kristin Miller, Allyson Cardinale (behind Kristin), Joelle Strickland, Gillian Peden and Allison Lewis. At right is eighth-grade teacher Jeannie Wallis.
Students serve by clearing trash and playing with kids
By Rebecca Ray
At St.Andrew's School in Saratoga, success is not measured by academic achievement alone. For the fourth year in a row, St.Andrew's students are participating in the school's Community Service Program, through which they help agencies to better serve the community by doing a variety of tasks, from picking up garbage to reading to children.
The Community Service Program was started by a parents group at St.Andrew's that calls itself the Community Service Board and whose purpose is to expose students to the problems and needs in the community, and to accustom them to the idea of serving others. Last year, as a result of its success, the Community Service Program was moved under the direction of the Parents Association Board, which runs school activities.
"Part of it is a concerned community of parents who really want to see community service stay alive," said parent coordinator Kathy Brown.
This year, St.Andrew's is serving 15 agencies, including Our Daily Bread, Saratoga Adult Day Care, Santa Maria Urban Mission and Sacred Heart of San Jose.
The school kicked off this year's Community Service Program with a chapel service on Oct. 26, at which Greg Jamison, president of the San Jose Sharks, spoke about the importance of giving back to the community. Later that day, sixth- through eighth-graders left campus to work with the agencies.
Kristen Perrota and other eighth-graders went to Lexington Reservoir and picked up all trash.
Other eighth-graders chose reading to children and playing with them at the Rosemary School Development Center. Throughout the year, two students will go there after school each week and help the day-care workers for two hours.
"The kids really appreciate it, and it's really fun," said eighth-grader Sunny Soroosh.
Eighth-grader Rachel Udall agreed.
"None of the kids knew me, but tons of them started hugging me," she said. "It makes you feel good, as well. You're doing something for yourself."
Students also helped out at Santa Maria Urban Ministries which takes donations of clothes and toys for homeless women and children, by folding and cleaning clothes, and deciding which toys were usable. At Sacred Heart of San Jose, they packed toiletry kits and grocery bags. One grocery bag feeds a family of three for one week. Older students also go to RAFT, Resource Area for Teachers, and sort through materials remade for teachers, from computers to cardboard tubes.
While seventh-graders made several hundred placemats at Loaves & Fishes, sixth-graders mopped and scrubbed walls, windows, floors, appliances, tables and racks at Our Daily Bread in Sunnyvale.
The sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-graders will get another half-day release from school to work with their assigned agencies in the spring.
Preschoolers through fifth-graders at St.Andrew's also learn the importance of community service and work with assigned agencies.
Preschoolers through third-graders make placemats and cards, sing songs and perform skits for the residents.
Fourth-graders hold a jump-a-thon for the American Heart Association's Jump for the Heart program.
Every week during lunch recess, four fifth-graders empty recycle bins and pick recyclable items from trash bins for Green Valley, the school's recycling program.
"These are the luckiest kids in the world, and this is the greatest opportunity for them to give back," said school Headmaster Harry McKay.
Saratoga, California Since 1955
