Friday, January 25, 2019
Vol. 79, No. 4
$1
SERVING PLAINVIEW, HICKSVILLE, AND LEVITTOWN Jewish center honors MLK Day with packing event
COOKING FOR COMMUNITY
BY GARY SIMEONE It was all hands on deck at the 4th annual ‘MLK Day of Service’ at the Mid Island Y Jewish Community Center last Monday. 354 volunteers spent their morning creating care packages for people experiencing food insecurity and poverty across Long Island. “This was just one event going on in 24 sites throughout our network,” said Gail Warrack, Director of Volunteer Services at the JCC. “Each site had a different activity going on to commemorate this special day.” There was plenty of wrapping and taping going on at the Mid Island Center, where volunteers from all over Long Island created over 1,200 packages to be sent out to five different agencies. Some of the agencies included the Huntington Interfaith Homeless Iniative, Long Island Program of Birthday Wishes and the Gerald Ryan Outreach Center in Wyandanch. A variety of items were placed inside the packages including supplies to make a warm meal, personal care items and toiletries like toothpaste, soaps and shampoo. Birthday bags were also filled for kids to help them celebrate their birthday’s. “There are over 4,000 people who are experiencing food insecurity and poverty here on Long Island,” said Warrack. “Items
Families, students, board members, and central and building administrators gathered at Levittown Memorial Education Center for an evening of delicious food and fun during Levittown’s Gerald R. Claps Career and Technical Center’s SkillsUSA Fundraiser Dinner on Jan. 10.
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Long Island Blues Winter Classic
The 9th Annual Town of Oyster Bay Long Island Blues Winter Classic will take place on Saturday, January 26th. This special event showcases LI Blues hockey players with special needs enjoying a game they love verse three other teams from the tri-state area. The public is welcome to attend and admission is FREE. Faceoff for the first of four games is at 3:30 pm. The fourth and final game is expected to conclude at approximately 8:30 pm. “The LI Blues is an inspir-
ing hockey program in which children and young adults with developmental disabilities play ice hockey in a wonderful setting,” said Town of Oyster Bay Supervisor Joseph Saladino. “This Classic brings all the fun of playing ice hockey to athletes with special needs. Three other teams, the Storm from Connecticut, the New Jersey Dare Devils and the New York Raptors will be participating and the Town welcomes these teams to the Town of Oyster Bay. We invite residents to come to this
event and cheer on the LI Blues. Their commitment and dedication to the sport is uplifting.” “The LI Blues organization is pleased to again be partnering with the Town of Oyster Bay to present the LI Blues Winter Classic,” Skip Theiss of LI Blues Special Hockey said. “We are very proud of our program which adapts the game of hockey to make it fun for players with special needs. The LI Blues Winter Classic is an outstanding piece of that program and we See page 13
Participants in the Mid Island Y’s MLK Day of Service with care bags packed for people in need.
Science Olympiad students compete PAGE 8 Learning about careers at OCR School PAGE 18