Friendship students make books their legacy to Northwest Community Hospital
In a corner of Kristin Hahn's eighth-grade classroom is what she calls a legacy wall. On it are framed stories of previous classes and their signature project completed during their last year at Friendship Junior High School in Des Plaines.
At the start of this semester, Hahn proposed the question to her current eighth-graders: What will be your legacy?
The group of 22 students, who live in Mount Prospect and Des Plaines and whose family cultures are wide-ranging and diverse, took the proposal seriously.
One of them, Jessica Skruch of Mount Prospect, came across Read Across America Day — celebrated every year on March 2 — and it gave her an idea. She suggested doing a book drive at the school, collecting books for hospitalized children who might find some comfort in reading.
“I like books,” Jessica said. “Books make me happy. I was trying to find something that would take their minds off of what was going on at the hospital.”
She presented her idea to the class and they immediately supported it, Hahn says. In fact, they were excited to get started.
After brainstorming, the students dubbed the project Book Buddies and started making signs to promote the drive, and even created an advertisement to share on the live video news that runs every morning in the school.
They came up with a slogan — A Book a Day Keeps You Happy. Hooray! — which one student captured in a bookmark design. Their promotion skills worked. In a week and a half, their collection boxes in 36 homerooms netted more than 2,500 children's books.
Then came the question of where to distribute them. Once again, Jessica took the lead and, together with her friend, Allorah Trier of Des Plaines, contacted Northwest Community Hospital in Arlington Heights, whose administrators were delighted.
Hahn and nine of her students delivered 500 of the books to the hospital last week, meeting with officials from the hospital foundation office as well as some of the hospital directors.
They also received a behind-the-scenes tour, including visiting the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, the labor and delivery floor, and the pediatrics department, where their 500 books will be housed.
Hospital officials plan to distribute the other 2,000 books through their Community Resource Center in the Palatine Opportunity Center, as well as through the Edgebrook Community Center and the Community School at Winston Campus, both in Palatine, and the Higgins Educational Center in Hoffman Estates.
“This is truly an amazing donation,” says Karen Baker, community services director for Northwest Community Healthcare. “All of these facilities serve at-risk children, and books are always needed. I know our kids are going to be just thrilled.”
In reflecting on the success of their project, Hahn's students said they were glad they had chosen reading as their legacy.
“Reading can take you somewhere,” said Nikhil Jacob of Des Plaines. “I'm barely aware of what's happening around me when I'm reading a book.”
Kripa Khanal of Mount Prospect agreed: “It's easy to share a good book with others. It's just something more personal.”
Students are eagerly looking forward to seeing their project go up on the legacy wall, and they hope it inspires the next group of eighth-graders.
“It's been great. We get the satisfaction of helping people, and that's what it's all about,” said Nick Rojas of Mount Prospect. “I hope when our project goes up on the wall that the next class finds it motivational — and does something even better.”