Students and staff from Abbey Lane Elementary School in the Levittown Public Schools recently gave back to families in need within their school community. The school hosted its annual Thanksgiving food drive throughout the month of November where they collected food items to provide Abbey Lane families who are facing hardships with a proper Thanksgiving meal.  

School social worker Lindsay Grand and nurse Karen Gallo helped organize the drive as staff members donated a turkey for each family and students brought in cans and boxes of food. The students quickly filled the donation box in the school lobby. Members of Abbey Lane’s Get a Voice Club helped organize the donations into separate boxes for the families and wrote letters to wish each family a Happy Thanksgiving. Any leftover donations will be brought to Wisdom Lane Middle School’s food pantry for community members in need. 

Photo captions:

1) Students and staff at Abbey Lane Elementary School collected food for the school’s Thanksgiving food drive. Pictured from left: Get a Voice Club members Riley Ruddy, Ally Schubeck, Cevana Barrios, Marianna Russo and Lily O’Connor.  

2) Fifth grader Ally Schubeck (left) from the Get a Voice Club helped organize the boxes. 

3) Fifth grader Lily O’Connor from the Get a Voice Club showed her support as she helped with the donation boxes. 

Photos courtesy of the Levittown Public Schools

This year, students from Northport High School united with the mission of providing Thanksgiving dinners for 200 people in the community through the Feed 200 initiative. Led by Northport High School senior David Kraydman, student captains mobilized their peers to donate enough food to provide for 83 complete meals. Each boxed meal contained canned vegetables, stuffing, gravy, potatoes, dessert items, and a $20 gift card to be used for the purchase of a turkey. All boxes will be distributed to Northport-East Northport families.
Over 50 separate classes and clubs took part in the initiative. With many freshman, sophomores and juniors also involved in the project, the students are eager to see how they can grow Feed 200 in the future.
The project was supervised by Interact Club advisor Brittany Klein, Key Club adviswr William Slagle and IB Diploma Program coordinator Wayne Jensen. The high school would like to thank the Northport High School custodial staff for their help throughout the project, Gary Ferrero of Liberty Moving for donating the boxes and to the entire Northport-East Northport community for supporting this worthwhile cause.

Photo caption: Students from Northport High School collected enough food to provide for 83 complete meals this Thanksgiving for area families.

Photos courtesy of Northport-East Northport School District

Levy Lakeside School in Merrick recently held its kickoff to the No Place for Hate program in grand fashion thanks to some very special guests.
Band members and cheerleaders from John F. Kennedy High School in Bellmore played songs and cheered on Lakeside students as they made their way into the school gymnasium for the celebration. The Kennedy cheerleaders also gave a special Lakeside Lions cheer! Students later signed a pledge to treat people fairly, be kind to others even if they are not like them and tell a teacher if they see someone being hurt or bullied.

Sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League, the No Place for Hate initiative identifies schools and communities that make a long-term commitment to combatting bias, bullying and hatred by coordinating activities geared toward teaching acceptance of all people. All three Merrick schools will be planning activities under the No Place For Hate initiative.  

Photo caption 1: Students at Levy Lakeside School make their way to their No Place for Hate kickoff to the sounds of the John F. Kennedy High School Marching Band.

Photo caption 2: The John F. Kennedy High School cheerleaders gave a big Lakeside Lions cheer to students and staff during the school’s No Place for Hate kickoff.

Photo caption 3: Christine LaMarca and her kindergarten students sign a No Place for Hate pledge at Levy Lakeside School.

Photos courtesy of the Merrick School District

The students, staff and families helped to make the annual food drive at Port Jefferson’s Edna Louise Spear Elementary School another successful endeavor. 

Under the leadership of elementary guidance counselor Jessica Peterson, the school community showed its generosity in aiding others with food collected that will benefit eight local families. Teachers also donated money so that each family could receive a gift card to a local food store.

Photo caption: From left, fifth grade students Ava Reilly, Madilyn Peterson and Annie McKeown organized collected food items for delivery. 

Photo courtesy of Port Jefferson School District

Over the past month, students at Harborfields High School have helped to raise awareness on a number of issues affecting the local community and have also dedicated time to giving back. 

On Nov. 6, members of both the high school’s Global Justice Club and the Harborfields Alliance for Community Outreach Club took on the challenge of a 24-hour fast to bring awareness to the lack of food security in the local community and beyond.  At the conclusion of their fast, the Global Justice Club hosted a pizza sale to raise money to help stock the local food pantry. 

On Saturday, Nov. 16, students from the school’s Outreach Club collected food for several hours outside Greenlawn Farms.  Students distributed a list of needed items for the community food pantry such as snacks, peanut butter, jelly, macaroni and cheese and cereal.  The district thanks all members of the Greenlawn community who contributed, as customers were more than generous with their shopping donations!

Photo captions:

1: Students from Harborfields High School’s Global Justice Club and the Harborfields Alliance for Community Outreach Club participated in a fast to raise awareness to the lack of food security in the local community and beyond.

2. Students from the Harborfields Alliance for Community Outreach Club collected food donations outside of Greenlawn Farms to benefit the community food pantry.
3. Members of the Harborfields Alliance for Community Outreach Club display the many food donations they collected from generous residents.

Photos courtesy of Harborfields Central School District