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Hilltop monkey business yields book money
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The Canfield High School Chamber Choir, directed by Kelly Scurich, provided the entertainment for the Hilltop Elementary School CHRISTIE Campaign assembly by performing several concert selections.
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Cathy Mowry (back), Hilltop Elementary School principal, celebrated the end of Right to Read Week with a class of second-graders, who dressed in their craziest outfits on Go Bananas Over Books Day, before the CHRISTIE Campaign assembly May 18.
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Charn Creed (left), Hilltop Elementary School first-grade teacher, and Cathy Mowry, Hilltop Elementary School principal (right) presented Francine McBride, program education coordinator, community, Akron Children’s Hospital Mahoning Valley, with the Hilltop students’ donation to the CHRISTIE Campaign May 18.
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Cathy Mowry, Hilltop Elementary School principal, celebrated Right to Read Week by dressing up as Curious George for a day. The Hilltop students surpassed last year’s total donation of $1,562.91 by raising $2,463.13 resulting in Mowry keeping her promise to dress up as the renowned monkey.
By ABBY SLANKER
To cap off Right to Read Week 2012, the students at Hilltop Elementary School celebrated their accomplishments with a little monkey business during an assembly May 18.
As part of the Right to Read Week activities, the students participated in the CHRISTIE Campaign. During the month of April, students accepted donations based on a reading goal they set for themselves.
The money collected will be used to purchase books for patients at Akron Children’s Hospital of the Mahoning Valley. They will be given to patients during admits and outpatient treatments. Each book will contain a label that states the book was donated by the children of Hilltop Elementary as part of their CHRISTIE Campaign.
As for the monkey business, in keeping with the Right to Read Week theme of Get Curious and Read, if a class brought in $200 or more in donations, the teacher had to wear a monkey for a day. If the school beat last year’s total of $1,562.91, Cathy Mowry, Hilltop Elementary School principal, had to dress up as Curious George for a day. The children raised $2,463.13, resulting in Mowry dressing up as the renowned monkey for the day of the assembly.
The Canfield High School Chamber Choir, directed by Kelly Scurich, provided the entertainment for the assembly by performing several concert selections, including solos by some students. Many of the high-schoolers were Hilltop alumni and were welcomed back to their school.
The choir closed their performance with a rockin’ performance of “Old Time Rock and Roll,” during which the Hilltoppers joined in by clapping to the beat.
Francine McBride, program education coordinator, community, Akron Children’s Hospital Mahoning Valley, was on hand to accept the students’ donation.
“Thank you so much for this donation. You should be very proud of yourselves. To you, what you did may be no big deal — you read every day. But it is a big deal. It is a big deal to the children whose hands these book are put into because they do want these books and they need these books.
“During the past 14 years, including this one, the students of Hilltop Elementary have raised $36,571.11 and have been able to purchase 13,750 books for use by patients at local children’s hospitals,” McBride said.