Elgin senior honored for volunteering

When Elgin High School senior Abe Lopez was walking the halls at school Wednesday, he was stopped by Principal Dave Smiley.

"He said, 'Congratulations,'" Lopez said. "I was completely clueless to what he was talking about."

Smiley explained that Lopez had won a President's Volunteer Service Award, given to high school students across the country who commit themselves to community service. This is the first time an Elgin student has received such an award, he said.

Volunteer activities are judged on criteria such as personal initiative, creativity, effort, impact and personal growth.

Lopez helped bring Pay It Forward tours to Elgin High School, which this year took three busloads of students on a weekend-long community service tour. The teens held a special event for nursing home patients, helped make building improvements in a low-income neighborhood and assisted tornado cleanup efforts in Tennessee.

Lopez has been involved in Pay It Forward tours since March 2006 when he went on a nine-day community service tour with a group based out of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The tours are operated through an organization called Students Stay Leaders Forever, whose mission is to reveal leadership through service relationships and action, Lopez said.

"I try to set an example for other Hispanic students," Lopez said. In addition to the community service events, the tours also include bonding activities and leadership building activities for the teens. "One of the biggest things of these tours is to break down the stereotypes of cliques in school. Everyone who has experienced a tour comes back with so much of a positive attitude and enthusiasm for volunteering."

Sponsored by Prudential Financial in partnership with the National Association of Secondary School Principals, his award was presented by the Prudential Spirit of Community Awards program on behalf of the President's Council on Service and Civic Participation.

Lopez plans to attend the University of Illinois in the fall, major in communications and one day land a job as a public relations specialist for a nonprofit organization. "I definitely want to keep community service as the focal point in my life," he said.