Also serving the communities of De Luz, Rainbow, Camp Pendleton, Pala and Pauma
Also serving the communities of De Luz, Rainbow, Camp Pendleton, Pala and Pauma
Mrs. Powell's 4th grade students at Live Oak display the 47 pounds of coins they collected to benefit victims of the hurricanes. They came in second place with the first place class collecting 51 pounds.
LOE Student Lighthouse teams present the Hurricane Penny Drive to teachers to boast enthusiasm and participate, from left, Katelyn, Jordan, Emily, Jasmine and Shea.
Members of Troop 737 prep a room for painting during a community service project at Fallbrook United Methodist Church.
Scouts from Troop 737, from left, Zachary English, Zeke Maletych, and Jordan Reyburn, far right, stand at the peak of Sugarloaf Mountain with their Scout Master, Chuck Reeder.
Scout Zeke Maletych works hard in an effort to earn rank advancement to Star Scout.
FALLBROOK — Students at Live Oak Elementary School have pooled their pennies to help children whose lives have been upended by recent hurricanes. It’s an effort that has added up in more ways than one.
With more than 320 pounds of pennies collected – that’s $1,251.34 – from a two-week drive, students will donate the money to aid a school in Houston, where catastrophic flooding caused by Hurricane Harvey destroyed homes and damaged schools, and a school in Florida, where residents are struggling in the wake of Hurricane Irma.
In wanting to help their peers who had lost not only their homes but their school communities in the disasters, the school’s student Lighthouse teams put their heads together to come up with a plan. That’s when they remembered “Hearts for Estrella,” a fundraiser organized last year to benefit a student battling leukemia.
Students had hoped to raise at least $100 that the recipient schools can use to buy new supplies. They saw a lot of support early on.
“I’ve been around the classes and the cans are almost full,” sixth grader Shea Morgan, 11, said just one week into the drive. “I have high expectations for this school, especially the lower grades because they’re really into it.”
The payoff for the fourth, fifth and sixth graders who organized the campaign is being able to put the principles they are learning through “The Leader In Me” into action.
To launch the penny drive, students practiced their public speaking skills and delivered presentations to their 650 classmates at the K-6 school.
Teacher Jennifer Moore said the presenters were evaluated on making eye contact, shakings hands with each teacher, and communicating the goals of the campaign clearly, loudly and slowly – a task that can be difficult at first for youngsters.
But students are also demonstrating something more subtle – how everyone can benefit from an investment in kindness.
“We learned over the years that helping people is pretty nice,” 11-year-old Jasmine Uresti said. “I’d like to do it for everyone in the world, but that’s pretty hard to do. So, we decided to start with Houston and Florida.”
A canister was placed in each classroom to collect donations. Moore said the class with the most donations by weight will be treated to an ice cream party. All denominations of coins were collected, as were dollars.
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