Community Service Day

Tabor Academy continued its bi-annual Community Service Day tradition this past week. On Wednesday, all students and faculty spent the morning doing a wide variety of community service activities. Each student at Tabor has a faculty advisor with whom they spent the day. Some advisory groups began their service as early as 6:00 am, heading off to serve breakfast to those in need.

Many students spent the day on campus hosting a number of outside groups. A group of Tabor students gave tours to students from Our Sisters’ School and Nativity Prep, while four advisories spent the day with Alma del Mar students. The kids did a variety of activities on campus including reading, a physics lesson, kickball, and a language and culture class.

Also on campus was Mrs. Helene Sughrue’s advisory, which has annually baked a large number of cookies that are then given to the Church of the Good Shepherd. Other students planted mums, cleaned the campus greenhouse, and watered plants at Tabor throughout the morning.

The majority of students left campus to do service throughout the Southcoast. Eleven advisories went to Gifts to Give’s new location in Acushnet to help sort donations and assist in the mill. Other groups went to the Wareham Free Library to do gardening and create story trails, while others traveled to the Friends Academy Community Garden. Almost 50 students headed to the Dartmouth YMCA Community Garden where they helped to harvest crops in an effort to fight hunger in the community. Other groups spent the morning working with the Save the Buzzards Bay Coalition and the Dartmouth Natural Resources Trust.

Although Wednesday was the Day of Service, the whole week was centered on the theme of serving others. On Monday, a speaker from the Massachusetts Faces of Homelessness Speakers’ Bureau came and on Thursday, Jim Stevens, CEO and founder of Gifts to Give, came to speak to the Tabor community about child poverty and giving to those in need.

The Day of Service sets the tone for the rest of the school year, in which students continue to give back through a variety of services. Lauren Boucher, the Director of Community Service, has put together a group of students to create a Community Service Board. This student group helps to organize service activities on the weekends. Other students do community service after school as an activity by going to Gifts to Give or tutoring at Sippican School.

In the spring, there will be another Day of Service. Throughout the year, though, Lauren Boucher coordinates service groups to go out into the community. Notify Boucher of any potential service activities in the local community at lboucher@taboracademy.org.

By Julia O’Rourke

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