Glen Ellyn students helping others through new club
Much like Kevin Spacey's character does in the movie “Pay It Forward,” Hadley Junior High teacher Hillary Shumate encouraged her students to think of something to help others, and put the plan into action.
So students from her eighth-grade language arts classes at the Glen Ellyn school decided to organize a series of fundraisers to assist an after-school program for low-income students.
“I've been a teacher at Hadley for 10 years. I've never had a group that just committed to something like this,” Shumate said. “I wrote to their parents, ‘Your children are absolutely amazing.'”
The students formed the group Helping Others Through Student Activities, and are planning to sponsor their first fundraiser, a rock concert, after school today in the Hadley gymnasium.
Proceeds will be donated to the Glen Ellyn Children's Resource Center, which serves children in kindergarten through sixth grade in Glen Ellyn who qualify for the free or reduced lunch program. Many students are children of refugees or immigrants.
The show will star the band Rebelmann, featuring four Hadley students. Fans are asked to bring $2 and a can of food as admission.
In “Pay It Forward,” Spacey's character Eugene Simonet asked his students how they could change the world. Shumate played the movie during her three language arts classes as part of the “Caring Classroom” unit.
“We all came up with ideas after answering the question from the movie,” said Meredith Miscinski, 13, one of the HOTSA organizers.
Elliot Hamilton, 13, said one of the vocabulary words in his class was “philanthropy.”
“We thought of examples of it,” he said.
Both students say it's the first time they've had a classroom lesson turn into something beyond just lecture, discussion and a homework assignment.
This was something real world.
The resource center is at Lincoln Elementary School in Glen Ellyn, serving 65 students. It started in 2002 as one of 14 after-school and summer educational support programs funded by DuPage County. After funding was cut in 2004, residents formed a nonprofit to keep it going.
Today, the Glen Ellyn center is one of only two that remain.
Students come to the center for two hours every day, get a healthy snack, and receive one-on-one tutoring help from community volunteers, said Katie Galli Holden, the center's program director.
The nonprofit is overseen by a nine-member board of directors and has an annual budget of $160,000 — of which $60,000 is covered by in-kind donations, such as the space provided by Lincoln School.
Since the center is funded entirely by grants and private donations, fundraising efforts — such as those of the Hadley students — certainly help, Galli Holden said.
“We're hoping to expand to other schools in Glen Ellyn,” she said. “We want to build our fundraising base to have other sites.”
Hadley students say their next fundraiser will likely be a movie event in the Hadley auditorium this winter.