Inside King's-Edgehill School
What a great year of volunteering this has been. Our students have worked throughout the Windsor community and beyond, at nursing homes, with Mermaid Theatre, at a drugstore, with churches in their communities and with residential homes. Our volunteers were devastated to lose the opportunity to visit all their new friends as the spread of COVID-19 cancelled school and with it, our volunteer programmes. To address this, we started two programmes from home: Cards of Caring and a Pen Pal programme. With Cards of Caring, volunteers were given the addresses of local nursing homes to send homemade cards. The cards were addressed to “A Resident in Need of a Smile”, popped into the mail, and were distributed randomly by nursing home staff. These were amazing! The bright colours, the artwork and the warm sentiments inside spread joy, for sure.
The Pen Pal programme was a little different and quite special. Before COVID-19, we had several students going to Kings Meadow in Windsor. At this adult residential facility, some of our students did arts and crafts, some ran a Japanese culture and language programme, one helped with guitar practice, and others shadowed their staff to see what careers in recreational programming, occupational therapy and nursing might look like, lending a helping hand wherever it was needed. Our KES family developed close bonds with the residents, and everyone was missing the chance to be able to get together again. The Pen Pal programme matched each of these residents with one of our students to write letters back and forth this spring, and these letters will no doubt continue into the summer. The letters have started to arrive, and you can see the excitement it is generating! I’m so proud of all our volunteers.
Times are tough for everyone, but these dedicated students have truly taken to heart the philosophies of our School and to give of themselves to make someone else smile. A big shout out to our pen pals: Gabby Shaw, Alejandro Vidal, Hannah Stilwell, Megumi Tsuji (whose letter is en route from Japan to her partner), Laura Gillis, Eva Redmond, Kelly Bouwman and Jessica Ugwoke.
Community involvement is a huge part of your child's education at King's-Edgehill School. We know that getting out and helping others builds connection, confidence and empathy; plus it just makes our students happy.
