Good Citizenship

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Good Citizenship
Each year Hours for Ours students and mentors
participate in Student Driven service learning
projects throughout the school year. This years
projects were funded by the Unity Foundation of
LaPorte County through the generosity of the
Phillip A. Sprague Care Share.
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Good Citizenship
Elementary Schools Pre-Project Surveys
Grades 1-5 What is community
service? Helping others by volunteering and
donating Where you help around the
community Helping others (3) Not sure Helping and
giving time or a resource Helping and giving and
sharingfood, water etc. Doing something for
someone without pay or reward Anything or service
voluntarily done for someone without pay or
reward Serving the community and giving back to
them (2) Things you can do to help other
people Helping people in our area Have you
participated in any Community Service projects
in the past? YES--- 7 NO---- 6 Were you able to
contribute to the planning of this project?
YES--- 7 NO---- 6
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Good Citizenship
Elementary School Pre-Project Surveys Grades
1-5 What is community service? Performing
an act or service to better the
community Volunteering (2) Helping others It is
helpful and caring volunteering Volunteering time
to help better the community Have you
participated in any Community Service projects
in the past? YES--- 1 NO----
5 Were you able to contribute to the planning of
this project? YES--- 1 NO---- 5
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Good Citizenship
Site Barker Middle School Pre-Project
Surveys Project Pennies for Patients and Deaf
School Visit Grades 6-8 What is community
service? Giving back to the community and
helping others When you help people When you help
someone in the community or it benefits
someone Helping and doing something for your
community A source that helps less fortunate
people Help people (4) Getting hours for helping
in the community Helping the community Have
you participated in any Community Service
projects in the past? YES--- 10
NO---- 2 Were you able to contribute to the
planning of this project? YES--- 9
NO---- 3
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Good Citizenship
Site Elston Middle School Pre-Project
Surveys Project Diversity Garden Grades
6-8 What is community service? Where you help
others in your community to make it better To
spend time in a location to do community
work When you volunteer to do something Doing
something nice for you school with groups Doing
things for free throughout the community Helping
to keep your community clean When you do
something to help the community Picking up trash
on the street Have you participated in any
Community Service projects in the past?
YES--- 6 NO---- 3 Were you able to
contribute to the planning of this project?
YES--- 3 NO---- 6
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Good Citizenship
Site Michigan City High School Pre-Project
Surveys Project Pennies for Patients and Deaf
School Visit Grades 9-12 What is community
service? When you give free services to your
community, like cleaning, planting flowers and
etc. Community service is doing something to help
your community Helping out your community Work
for helping the community Something to help the
community (2) When you go and help others in your
community When you help the community in every
way Helping and giving your time freely Its
giving back just for the good of
everyone Community Service is any act that
benefits the community Have you participated in
any Community Service projects in the past?
YES--- 10 NO---- 2 Were you able to
contribute to the planning of this project?
YES--- 9 NO---- 3
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Good Citizenship
Elementary School Post-Surveys Grades 1-5
What did you learn from this project? There is
always someone in need that you can help Helping
people is best It made us feel good to help
(2) It was a good feeling to make someone
something Creative skills, layout of patterns,
design techniques, thematic concepts,
lettering Layout To help people It was nice to
know we were involved in helping others What did
you like best about the project? Gluing all the
photos and designing the mat The designing
(3) Looking at the different pictures and gluing
them together Making the placemats Colors and
designs of placemats Fun Will you tell your
family and friends about your experience? YES---
8 NO---- 1 Would you consider being involved in a
Community Service project again? YES---
9 NO---- 0
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Good Citizenship
122 Students in Grades 1 to 11 Participated 120
Mentors Participated 13 Service Projects
Completed in 11 of 13 School Sites
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Good Citizenship
Anthony and Deanna have been matched for the past
4 years and know that it is a great feeling to
reach out to others, just as they have for each
other through the Hours for Ours mentoring
program. We are the only two (mentor/mentee) that
meet at Elston Middle School during the Friday
7th grade lunch period and we felt that after
sitting and talking to each other over Anthony's
lunchtime and not having a lot of interaction
time other than playing games or him listening to
me talk while he eats his lunch. Anthony and I
decided to mail out 32 sympathy cards to the
families of the Virginia Tech shootings. We
agreed that each of us write 16 Thinking of You
cards at home and then sign them together on
Fridays when we met for Hours for Ours. The cards
will be sent to the families in care of the
President of Virginia Tech College. Our goal is
to send our thoughtful messages to these families
who have lost their loved ones. Anthony and I
have become good friends through our 4 year
relationship that we have formed through the
Hours for Ours mentoring program, and our
reaching out to others will help strengthen our
friendship and increase our awareness of other
peoples' needs in our own community and around
the world. We will continue activities that
encourage and uplift others and make us better
people. Deanna Carlson, Mentor and Anthony M.
Elston Middle School
Elston Middle School
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Good Citizenship
Elston Middle School
A deep purple magnolia and a pink flowering crab
tree will anchor a 5 x 19 Diversity Garden to
celebrate the rich cultures of the students and
staff at Elston Middle School. Elston mentees,
mentors, and Mrs. Greshams science class will be
digging in the dirt the Last week of May to plant
30 different perennials that her science class
researched. The excitement from the students was
overwhelming in both the science class and the
mentees in the Hours for Ours program. This was
our first year planning and completing a service
project at Elston and students want to know when
we can start on next years plans.
Clarks Secret Garden has partnered with Hours
for Ours for the past 2 years with different
gardening projects and again this year Clarks
gave Hours for Ours a 50 discount on the tress
and plants.
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Good Citizenship
Knapp, Joy and Niemann
Knapp and Joy lunchtime and Joys after-school
mentoring programs decided to share their
Service Learning projects by providing and
serving a dinner for the Mens Homeless Shelter.
Students and mentors designed the menu and
completed the dinner with handmade and laminated
place mats for the gentlemen. Over 20 men were
treated to the meal at First Presbyterian Church
on March 12. The students knew the meal would
be served after the regular school day. They
would not be able to be a part of serving the
meal, but they wanted the men to know, by making
the place mats, that the students at Joy and
Knapp cared. We have attached a sample of the
place mats. There were many designs such as hand
written notes wishing them a good day, pictures
drawn of Michigan City, and many other creative
ideas. Two mentors from the MC library were kind
enough to laminate all the place mats for the
shelter to use again or the gentleman that took
part in the dinner were able to take with them.
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Good Citizenship
In November, I received an email from the
computer lab teacher at Edgewood elementary
school. The email was concerning a 16 year old
girl who was stricken with a rare form of cancer.
Besides prayers the teacher was asking for
donations of any kind to help this young lady who
was given 6 months to live. I thought right away
that this could be a perfect service learning
project for Niemann and Marsh, and after speaking
with the site coordinator Mullen elementary
school she also wanted to help with this project.
The students and mentors decided to make two
baskets full of goodies, one from Mullen and one
from Niemann and Marsh combined. The mentors
donated items and money to purchase an MP3
player, the mentees made get well cards and
decorated them with glitter, confetti, and even
jokes. We were able to find out what things she
liked such as her favorite color, her favorite
type of music and group, and her favorite animal.
In January we had to put a rush on the project
due to her failing health. The mentors and
mentees were 100 cooperative. Before she passed
away we were able to grant her Christmas wish to
have an MP3 player, and she enjoyed the cards the
kids made for her. We gave the items she wasnt
able to receive to her mother who donated them in
her name to a childrens hospital. The young
ladys mom is interested in becoming a mentor and
we hope she will join us. Now that's what I call
a "Service Learning Project"!! Lyn Isbell
Liz
Westphal Site Coordinator
Site Coordinator Marsh/Niemann
Schools Mullen School

Mullen, Marsh, and Niemann
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Good Citizenship
Pine Elementary
For our Service Learning Project this year at
Pine, we created greeting cards which will be
sent to the Indiana Veterans Home in West
Lafayette, Indiana. We made about 27 cards,
including Get Well, Happy Birthday, Have a
Great Day, and Happy Halloween. The cards
were of various greetings, as suggested by the
Community Relations chairperson, Ms. Carolyn
Johnson, so that they can be distributed on an
as-needed basis throughout the year to those most
in need of a cheery greeting. She suggested
that, since many Valentines Day and Christmas
cards are received by the residents, and at other
occasions during the year the residents receive
very few cards, general, basic greetings would be
very welcome. We began Feb. 7, and will complete
all cards this week. They will be mailed to the
facility within the next week or two. Two goals
were in mind with this project first,
demonstrating to the students that everyone has
talents and abilities that can be used towards
helping another in some small way, and second, we
can oftentimes give to others with tools and
objects we already have at hand, expensive kits
or supplies are not always necessary. The
supplies we used to create the cards were glue,
construction paper, markers/paints, crayons, and
old magazines used to cut out pictures.
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Good Citizenship
Barker Middle School and Michigan City high
school students and their mentors in the Hours
for Ours program did a service learning project
during their lunch hours the week of March 9th.
The students saw the importance of raising spare
change to help find cures for leukemia, lymphoma
and myeloma while providing information and
support services to patients and their families.
The program taught students empathy, sharing,
respect for others, the value of community
service in supporting important causes, and
awareness to the blood cancers that have affected
some students that live in our community. The
project was dedicated to three Michigan City area
students who all had leukemia, Steven Skoczek,
who passed away in 2005, Stacy Brown, diagnosed
in 2005 and is a freshman at Ferris State
University, and Jessica Dahlberg, diagnosed at 3
and is currently a junior at MCHS. During
2005-2006, two hundred fifteen schools
participated in the Pennies for Patients program
across Indiana, raising 265,000. The support of
MCHS and Barker Middle School Hours for Ours
students positively impacts our ability to find
cures for blood cancers.
Barker Middle School And Michigan City High
School
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Good Citizenship
Krueger Middle School
This year at Krueger Middle School the students
began a pen pal correspondence with residents of
a local nursing home. This gave both the
students and letter recipients the chance to
establish a friendship through letter-writing.
Both parties learn about one another through this
old-fashioned form of communication with the
fun of anticipating a response and the mystique
of maybe never meeting in person. Being a
generation where modern technologies allow
instant messaging, this project teaches the value
of corresponding through letter-writing, puts to
practice reading and writing skills, and most
importantly creates a unique friendship.
Letters from Krueger Students
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Good Citizenship
Barker Middle School
On Wednesday, May 8, 2007, nine students in the
Hours for Ours Mentoring Program at Barker Middle
School invited a few students from The Black Oak
School for the Deaf to visit our school. The
students from the Deaf School, along with their
teacher, demonstrated to our sixth graders some
American Sign Language and answered questions
about what its like to live being Deaf.
The Black Oak School for the Deaf is a new school
operating on a limited budget, so our sixth grade
students presented them with some office and
school supplies donated through the Hours for
Ours Program. This was a great learning
experience for our Barker students.
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Good Citizenship
Michigan City High School
On Tuesday, May 15th, 2007 six students in the
Hours for Ours Mentoring Program at MCHS invited
7 students from the Deaf Ministry of First
Baptist Church to visit our school. The students
from the Deaf School along with their teacher
asked question to our students, and answered
question regarding of how and what it was like to
live Deaf. The Deaf Ministry is on a limited
budget so our MCHS students presented them with
some books that they could use in class. These
were donated through the Hours for Ours Program.
Our students were very interested in learning
more about American Sign Language.
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Good Citizenship
Edgewood Elementary decided to help the La Porte
County Autism programs "Camp Circle of Friends
for Children with Autism" for their service
project this school year. Donations of cameras
for the summer camps last week. Karen Cooper
the Autism Consultant said We are so thankful
for having you do this for us. Each camper will
be taking pictures daily and making a poster and
keeping a journal. This is so helpful in
teaching the campers life skills. You and your
organization are very special and we are very
thankful that you found us and offered your
assistance. If you have the time, stop by camp
and visit...we will take your picture. The dates
of camp were June 18-22 and June 25-29.
Edgewood Elementary
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Good Citizenship
A quote from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is still
true today Intelligence Plus Character That
is the Goal of Education