13 minute read
Community Service
Community SERVICE
Pennington students give back in myriad ways
Students at Pennington don’t ask if they can get involved in community service; they figure out individual ways to make a difference. Each year, Dr. Hawkey asks our community members to leave Pennington a better place than they found it, and this aim is embedded in activities by groups ranging from the Green Team to our fabulous Campus Guides and Student Ambassadors to the students who volunteer on School committees, such as the landscape master plan committee. We believe that service is an important component of what it means to be a good citizen. Because we expect our students to become involved in many different ways in their own communities and on campus, we neither require service nor officially track student service hours. However, because of our close involvement with several nonprofits, service trips, our annual Community Day, and the Horizon senior internship program, virtually 100% of Pennington students do participate in some form of community service, under the direction of Chad Bridges and David Hallgren.
Faculty and staff members are also dedicated to serving others. Some lead groups to volunteer at places ranging from the Christina Seix Academy in Trenton, where STEM leaders bring their skills to elementary classrooms, to Guatemala to save endangered turtles and to build homes, and even to Africa in 2020, a first for Pennington. On campus, every faculty advisor is involved in the School’s new composting program. Global Studies and Applied Science speakers offer glimpses of a number of ways to help make the world a better place.
Student travel, both within the United States and abroad, is often grounded in the goal of Pennington’s Global Studies program: to provide learning opportunities that help our students form relationships inside and outside of the classroom and develop a sense of responsibility for themselves, for others, and for the world in which they live. This is the heart of service learning.
Some of the ways in which The Pennington School is involved in community service are highlighted below. We will include more clubs and groups in future issues of Pennington Magazine; there are simply too many to include all of them here!
Because service is at the heart of what it means to be a student at Pennington, our community embraces the culture of giving back, which reflects our core values of honor, virtue, and humility.
HomeFront Gym & Swim A popular volunteer opportunity for many of our students is the HomeFront Gym & Swim. Almost every other Friday during the academic school year, dozens of Pennington students take time out of their weekend to brighten the day for many children who are clients of HomeFront, an organization based in Lawrenceville dedicated to ending homelessness in the local community. Children are bused to Pennington so they can participate in a night full of fun activities planned by Pennington students. Each Gym & Swim offers time for Pennington students and the children to play basketball, frisbee, or other games together in Sparks Gymnasium, and it offers the opportunity to go swimming at the Michael T. Martin Aquatic Center. Other events vary week-by-week but often include scavenger hunts, games, or practicing a performance. The students work closely with faculty advisors Peter Walsh and School Chaplain David Hallgren to make each Gym & Swim special for their guests.
For Community Service Club leaders Molly Gibbard ’21 and Julia McDougall ’21, getting involved was an easy choice. Both students became involved in the Community Service club their freshman year. After participating in Gym & Swim for the first time, they knew they wanted to keep it up. “I came to my first Gym & Swim my freshman year. I was helping out a little kid in the pool who was so excited to swim and hang out with other people, and it was a very memorable experience. Since then, I try to come to as many Gym & Swims as I can,” says Gibbard.
As for McDougall, her favorite part of Gym & Swims has been seeing “kids’ smiles and excitement every week.”
—John (Jack) Fancher ’20 Gym & Swim participant
One day at a time, our students are making the world a better place by meeting the needs of the local and global community.
HomeFront Holiday Party For the twenty-sixth consecutive year, the Pennington School community came together to host its annual HomeFront Holiday Party on Saturday, December 14, 2019. The Holiday Party is a Pennington tradition; Pennington students and faculty members host guests from HomeFront, a local organization serving those in need in Mercer County. The annual party offers neighbors from HomeFront a luncheon provided by Sodexo and served by Pennington students and staff, a visit and photo with Santa, arts and crafts stations, a dance party complete with deejay, bingo for adults, a book corner, and more. A highlight of the party is Santa’s Workshop, where the HomeFront families, parents and children alike, all have the opportunity to “shop” for gifts to give their loved ones. The Pennington senior class Peer Leaders worked hard to ensure that there was a present in Santa’s Workshop for every child at the party, and the School’s faculty and staff donated gifts for children to give to their parents. There were about 350 guests in total at the event. In Santa’s Workshop, HomeFront guests selected items for children whose ages ranged from infants to teenagers. In addition, books, hats, scarves, and gloves were distributed to all attendees. The Pennington School’s community supported the cause by donating unwrapped presents, decorating “Giving Trees” around campus with winter gear, and bringing in new and gently used books. Many current students volunteered at the event itself to set up and clean up, and to host individual tables for the visiting families. Parents, faculty, and staff pitched in to help with registration, serve food, and wrap presents.
—Scott (CJ) Caponi ’22
HomeFront is a Mercer County not-for-profit organization devoted to ending homelessness and poverty in central New Jersey, and the School’s annual party has become a beloved tradition for all involved.
The Power of Music James Horan, teacher of music, composed a beautiful song, “In Our Eyes,” to raise awareness of the global refugee crisis, inspired by The Power of Faces refugee portrait project. In conjunction with the Global Studies Program, the Silva Gallery of Art hosted The Power of Faces: Looking at the Global Refugee Crisis in May, 2019. The exhibition is a portrait project created by husbandand-wife photo team Daniel Farber Huang and Theresa Menders P’21 as an artistic response to what the United Nations has called the greatest humanitarian crisis of our time. Huang and Menders’s work reminds us that the more than 65 million who have been forced to flee their homes because of conflict or persecution are human lives, not just statistics. Huang and Menders created a music video with Horan’s composition that was launched on United Nations Day, October 24, 2019.
Refugee inspires Malawi Club Jacques Baeni Mwendabandu, a refugee living in Malawi, Africa, visited the Pennington campus October 15–16, 2019, to speak to students, visit classrooms, and meet with Malawi Club members. Mwendabandu was a guest speaker in several Pennington classes including Environmental Science, Global Studies, Algebra 1A, and Grade 6 Humanities.
Mwendabandu also met with Applied Science and Global Studies students on October 15 to describe his life as a refugee and his hopes and dreams for the future. During his presentation, he explained that he is from the Democratic Republic of Congo and currently living in the Dzaleka refugee camp in Malawi. Due to the violence in his home country, he found it necessary to leave and find a more peaceful home. He traveled to Tanzania before settling in the Malawian refugee camp. While at the camp, he founded Vijana Africa, a community-based organization focused on the promotion of gender equality and reduction of poverty and hunger. This organization promotes income-generating activities, such as rabbit farming and gardening, which Mwendabandu explained in some of Pennington’s classes. Because of his efforts at the camp, Mwendabandu was awarded a Mandela Washington Fellowship and has spoken internationally about the refugee crisis.
After Mwendabandu gave a brief overview of the camp, several students asked additional questions about jobs at Dzaleka, the education system, and some challenges he faced. Through these answers, he explained that although the 40,000 refugees receive some assistance, it is not nearly enough. When he arrived, he was given a plot of land and a tent, but he had to build his house on his own. He created his own bricks and spent months building his home. Mwendabandu also told students that there are 14,000 children residing at Dzaleka, but only 7,000 are able to go to school. Many parents created their own informal education system so their children can receive an education. In addition, refugees are not allowed to work, so almost all jobs are volunteer positions. To buy additional resources like sugar or cooking oil, refugees must learn some new skills or become entrepreneurs. For example, some students in school at the camp are taught photography and videography so they can
44 Pennington Magazine Fall/Winter 2019–20 then make videos of weddings, funerals, or special events.
A group of Pennington students will be traveling to Malawi in March 2020. They will use their developing STEM skills to bring technology and innovation to the children in the Dzaleka refugee camp. Pennington students are currently working on three different technology and design projects, and they will share their work while engaging in cultural and educational experiences with students in the Dzaleka schools.
Malawi Projects Sanitary napkin hybrid developed Girls in developing countries often miss school because of menstrual periods; they lack the sanitary products needed to allow them to leave their homes to study. This often leads to girls dropping out of school entirely at a young age. Understanding that disposable sanitary napkins are not widely available, and that a lack of water
completed desk to the refugee classroom and adjust their design or approve it for mass production.
makes reusable products difficult to adopt, Pennington Girls in STEM set out to design a hybrid sanitary napkin. They started on a first iteration in early November 2019, then field-tested the product over the next couple of months before getting back together in midJanuary to tweak it. Ms. Overhiser was a valuable resource for the girls as they designed and sewed!
New desk design for refugee camp school Upper School students in the Malawi Club worked on a desk design project for the primary school at the Malawi refugee camp. The final design was rendered in CAD software by Matthew Cooper ’21 and sent to a factory in Lilongwe so a prototype could be created and tested. When Pennington students go to Malawi in March 2020, they will take the iPads for refugee students Pennington Applied Science students have been refurbishing iPads all year in order to deliver them to students in the Dzaleka refugee camp in Malawi. The iPads will be preloaded with education apps, books, and other learning tools tested and selected by Pennington students. Dzaleka students of all ages will use the iPads for learning a host of subjects and skills. iPads are wellsuited for educational purposes in the camp due to their long battery life, durability, and ease of use. Students traveling to Malawi to deliver the devices will also bring with them a solar-powered charging cart. The group will teach the Dzaleka students how to use the iPads to exponentially increase their learning opportunities.
The Reverend David Hallgren became Pennington’s chaplain in the summer of 2019. Hallgren is the associate pastor of the Pennington Presbyterian Church, where he has worked with multiple generations within that congregation. He was born of the Yakima Nation in eastern Washington and was adopted by a Swedish-American Mennonite couple at the age of two. He began working as a building contractor but became hooked on ministry with children while volunteering at Camp Firwood in Bellingham, Washington, one summer, when he also met his wife, Kristin. They live with their two young daughters in Pennington. Hallgren has a bachelor’s degree in history from the University of Washington and a master of divinity degree from Princeton Theological Seminary.
Beach Sweep Sixteen students were “citizen scientists” on Saturday, October 26, tallying and categorizing trash found on Belmar beach as part of Clean Ocean Action’s annual Fall Beach Sweep. They found a lot of small pieces of plastic such as straws, bottle caps, and wrappers, but many other items as well. The outing was organized by the Green Team, which hopes to continue the tradition into future years.
Peer Leaders encourage all to Run for the Cure The Pennington School hosted its tenth annual Run for the Cure on Sunday, October 27, 2019. The Run, organized by the Pennington School senior Peer Leaders, raises money each year for the Susan G. Komen Foundation, an organization that raises awareness, educates the community, funds research, and offers supportive services for those with breast cancer. The Peer Leaders asked participants to support the fight against breast cancer through donations, running, or both.
Despite a torrential downpour, community members came out in great numbers to support this cause!
Guatemala On June 16 through June 26, 2019, Pennington students traveled to beautiful Sipacate, Guatemala, to volunteer with a turtle conservation group in a quiet beach town directly east of Guatemala City. Students helped with activities including patrolling beaches, relocating turtle eggs to hatcheries to protect them from predators, building hatcheries, and releasing turtle hatchlings.
In March 2020, a group of Middle School students will travel to Guatamala to volunteer with the organization From Houses to Homes, working alongside Guatemalan families to build muchneeded housing.
— Kofoworola Jolaoso ’20 Spanish Club pursues service opportunities in Trenton World Language clubs often get involved in community service activities. In October 2019, students from the Spanish Club and several Spanish classes went to Trenton to help the Eastern Service Workers Association celebrate Halloween with the children from that community. Jose Hernandez, who is a member of the School kitchen staff, is part of this organization and went on this visit to share the day with the Pennington students.
“At Pennington, pretty much every student helps in some way with community service—at the HomeFront Holiday Party, Gym & Swim, during food/clothing drives, or even in simple ways like smiling at your peers and holding doors. The Community Service Club participates in and organizes as many events and activities as possible each year.”
—Molly Gibbard ’21
STEM Leaders visit Seix Academy The STEM Leaders Club visits the Christina Seix Academy to work with elementary school students on various activities. On September 25, they helped first-grade classes design and fly paper airplanes. The firstgrade students acted like scientists as they figured out the best way to get their planes to fly through the air. An added challenge was to carry as many paper clips as possible.
