Community Outreach
Since our inception, The Presentation School has made an overwhelming
effort in the area of global responsibility. In the 2004-2005
school year, our global outreach program focused on the victims
of the tsunami in Indonesia. After researching needs, the entire
student body and school community raised enough money to buy
three boats for fishermen in a small village outside of Sri
Lanka. These boats afforded the locals the opportunity to return
to work and to earn once again their livelihood from the natural
resource of the ocean.
In any of our efforts to help those in need, our students
have been enriched by the lessons planned by their teachers
about the people, the culture, the politics, and the history
of each of these locations.
2003-2004: Each class chose a local project
for this year’s outreach.
2002-2003: We chose SMILE TRAIN as our global
outreach project this year. Smile Train is an established medical
cooperative, which annually provides free cleft surgery and
related treatment for approximately 25,000 children around the
world. We provided funds for nine such surgeries in underdeveloped
countries.
2001-2002: Helping less fortunate students
in this school year, we collected school supplies for BASKSHEESH
which provided students with pens, pencils, notebooks, paper,
erasers, and crayons in Nicaragua and Bosnia. We sent dollars
to D.C. at our President’s request and participated in
an EarthDay clean up at Curry Village in Yosemite.
2000-2001: Our fundraising efforts this school
year were for the Kids Helping Kids Program of the United States
Fund for UNICEF. Through our students’ money raising efforts,
children’s lives in developing countries were greatly
improved.
1999-2000: This school year we turned our
efforts toward a village in India. We responded to a call from
a Catholic priest working with the poor in a small southern
village. We collected from the school community enough money
to send him the necessary funds to build five homes, with four
families living in each home. We also collected blankets for
Afghanistan and supported a homeless shelter in Santa Rosa.
1998-99: When the Presentation students learned
of the destruction left by Hurricane Mitch, they collected money,
which was sent directly to an Episcopalian minister who was
feeding 400 people a day in his Nicaraguan village. In addition,
twenty-four cartons of food were collected and sent through
the Nicaraguan Council General’s office to feed hurricane
victims. The Presentation students found another way to show
their concern for others this year. They donated over $1300.00
in pennies to the annual “Pennies of Leukemia Drive”
sponsored by the Leukemia Society. On the home front, the class
of 2000 provided a service to our local community by creating
a community vegetable garden tended and cared for by the students
and parent volunteers. Produce from the garden was donated to
meals on Wheels and was available to community members who lived
in the area.
1997-98: Raised funds and school supplies
for a school in Colfirito, Italy, which had been demolished
by the 1997 earthquake. Two student ambassadors from Presentation
went to Italy in February, 1998, viewed the earthquake devastation,
met with students and faculty from the school, and delivered
the money raised by our school community.
