When the holiday season approaches, students and staff spring into action to help others.
Following are projects schools undertook, with the information provided by school personnel.
Bettsville
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Calvert preschoolers and fourth-graders made more than 260 Christmas cards for St. Francis convent, home and apartments. Pictured are Addison Siebenaller, Allison Ott and Danielle Keckler.
National Honor Society traveled to Good Shepherd Home and hosted a Christmas party for the residents. Zion United Church of Christ, Salem United Methodist Church, Kansas St. James, St. Mary, Bettsville American Legion Riders, the Hossler family and the school joined to help 12 families.
Calvert
Calvert Elementary School preschoolers and fourth-graders made more than 260 Christmas cards for residents of St. Francis convent, home and apartments.
Carey
The elementary student council built a tent city out of cardboard boxes and collected coats, hats, gloves and scarves for Carey Memorial United Methodist Church's food pantry.
Clyde-Green Springs
Staff members helped sponsor families, student organizations donated money, organized food drives and assisted families on Angel Trees and the district collected canned and boxed food for the local food pantry.
Hopewell-Loudon
A class delivered and read Christmas books to kindergarteners. Chieftain Leadership Club sponsored a canned food drive competition among homerooms, with items collected being given to Fostoria's Sharing Kitchen. Members of National Honor Society and Student Council planned to visit and sing Christmas carols at St. Francis Home.
Mohawk
Mohawk High School's Family, Career and Community Leaders of America chapter sponsored a project, "Help Us Help Others," that collected items for Turning Point, a domestic violence shelter serving Wyandot County.
National Junior Honor Society sponsored a Thanksgiving food drive and was able to provide food to four families. Leftover food was to be donated to The Salvation Army.
The junior high and high school student councils sponsored a hat and glove tree again this year. Any student needing hats and gloves were welcome to take the items off the Christmas tree. The high school student council sponsored a blood drive through American Red Cross. The junior high student council raised money at the school craft show by having a bake sale, and the money was to be used to adopt a local family for Christmas.
Each year, Spanish Club does a shoebox project, which involves putting together shoe boxes of toys and personal care items to send to needy families in Mexico.
New Riegel
New Riegel Elementary School students visited the residents of Elmwood, Autumnwood and St. Francis nursing homes in Tiffin. They presented each resident with a Christmas ornament and card from the elementary and stopped in to chat. The elementary student council also helped sponsor a food drive conducted by brother and sister Grace Clouse, a third-grader, and Will Clouse, a second-grader.
Old Fort
Old Fort junior high and high school collected more than 300 new gloves, hats and scarves. Donations were to be taken to Seneca County Department of Job and Family Services to be used at a Christmas party.
St. Wendelin
National Honor Society members planned to gather to coordinate the distribution of Christmas baskets for 10 local families adopted through Fostoria's Bureau of Concern for the "Caring for Kids" project.
St. Wendelin Elementary Leadership, in conjunction with "Caring for Kids," sponsored a mitten tree in the school lobby where students, staff, faculty, parents and visitors were asked to bring in mittens, gloves and hats for the adopted families. A giving tree was adorned with paper ornaments listing toys a child requested as Christmas gifts. Faculty, staff, parents and students took the ornaments and purchased gifts for the children. National Honor Society students planned to collect monetary donations after Masses at St. Wendelin Catholic Church to purchase potatoes and ham and to supplement each of the Christmas baskets.
The school also collected new and gently worn coats that were donated to the "Coats for Christmas" program of Hancock County. Third-graders conducted a food drive for Fostoria's Sharing Kitchen.
Tiffin
Tiffin City Schools staff, administrators and the board of education had its sixth annual holiday giving project, and the drive brought in $1,864.07. The money allowed for the purchase of 254 turkeys that were donated to The Salvation Army. An additional $100 was donated to First Call for Help.
Staff, students and families at Lincoln Elementary School helped decorate the Christmas tree in the lobby of the school with donated hats, mittens and gloves, and the school conducted a canned food drive. All the donations - including more than 50 hats, mittens, gloves and scarves and more than 100 non-perishable food items - were to be given to The Salvation Army.
Upper
Sandusky
At Upper Sandusky Middle School, the staff adopted several Angel Tree families, and students and staff conducted a peanut butter drive because food pantries in the community were running short on the product due to the rising cost of peanuts. Also, several teachers and students planned to staff The Salvation Army kettles at local stores.
