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Neighbors | Jessica Harker .Fifth-grade students, paired up with their-sixth grade WEB leaders, joined together to create 40 tie blankets to donate to Akron Children's Hospital during the holiday season.
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Neighbors | Jessica Harker .Fifth-grade students worked with their sixth-grade WEB leaders to tie blankets on Dec. 18 at Boardman Center Middle School.
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Neighbors | Jessica Harker .Fifth-grade students, from left, Allison Bowser, Kaelyn DeBlois, Kaitlyn Casanova and Victoria Bagshaw showed off the booksmarks they decorated to be donated to local nursing homes.
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Neighbors | Jessica Harker .Boardman Center Middle School students, from left, Lilly Andrei, Olivia Combis, Christina Coutris and Dimitra Coutris worked to create bookmarks to donate to local nursing homes on Dec. 18.
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Neighbors | Jessica Harker .School counselor Mindy DePietro instructed students at Boardman Center Middle School about how to create tie blankets that would then be donated to Akron Children's Hospital.
By JESSICA HARKER
Boardman Center Middle School students gathered together to create crafts to benefit their community. School counselor Mindy DePietro said that this is the fifth year all of the fifth-grade students, along with the WEB leaders, created tie blankets and bookmarks to give to local organizations.
“It’s a fun craft that everyone can get involved in and they love doing it for a good cause,” DePietro said.
Forty blankets were constructed by students to be donated to Akron Children’s Hospital.
DePietro said the idea came from their first year working with WEB leaders when a student at Boardman was a patient at Akron Children’s and received a blanket.
“She said it really meant a lot to her and now we want to make sure that is something we continue,” DePietro said.
She explained that there is currently a fifth-grade student who is a patient at Akron Children’s that the students will make a special blanket and cards for him.
“We want him to know that he is part of our family even though he is not at the school,” DePietro said.
Along with blankets the students made 420 laminated bookmarks to donate to local nursing homes.
Beeghly Oaks, Shepherd of the Valley in Boardman and Vista Center will all receive a portion of the bookmarks made by students.
“Bookmarks can be used year round, and they are coloring more interesting designs,” DePietro said.
Along with the fifth-grade class, 80 sixth-graders designated as WEB leaders assisted in the project.
WEB leaders are students who apply for leadership roles, and spend the year mentoring a group of 8-10 fifth-grade students.
The program is in conjunction with the LINK leaders in Boardman High School.
“They are like the leaders of the school, they are our role models,” DePietro said.
She explained to become a WEB leaders students have to have good grades, be active in their school and above all be kind.
“They are able to foster that relationship, give them advice, get to know them with relationships that are both academic and social,” DePietro said. “I always tell them they are our eyes and ears.”
Supplies for the blankets and bookmarks were purchased through money provided by the school’s PTA according to DePietro.
She said she hoped all donations would be dropped off to community groups on Dec. 21.