A little giving brings big rewards
Published: February 19, 2007
Susan Jahnke, a first- grade teacher at John F. Kennedy Elementary School, began collecting pennies in a little red pail outside her classroom 20 years ago.
During the holidays, she and her class would tally up their collection and send a check to the Westport-based nonprofit charity, Save the Children.
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Back then, Jahnke said, the checks they wrote were usually for $30 to $50.
“It wasn’t the amount of the gift,” Jahnke said. “It was the fact that we were giving.”
This year, Jahnke, with help from fellow first-grade teachers Robin Moore and Cheryl Nethercott and the rest of the students at Kennedy, raised about $1,056 for Save the Children.
Peg Blackburn of Save the Children visited the school recently to thank the students and present them with certificates.
“You are all ambassadors,” Blackburn said to the first-graders. “You represent the idea of reaching out to children who don’t have as much as you. What you did was a good thing.” In the two decades she has been raising funds for Save the Children, Jahnke has collected over $16,000. The idea to support Save the Children, Jahnke said, came from one of her own teachers.
“I had a college professor, Joan Haines, who passed away,” said Jahnke. “She had visited Africa and shared with me the poverty there. This was her favorite charity, and I adopted it. I like that I can be in touch with Save the Children locally, even though it’s a global charity.”
Jahnke’s fund-raising has spread beyond the first grade.
“It’s a whole school effort,” said parent volunteer Cathy Betz. “And it’s growing.”
In 2004, Jahnke began organizing a benefit raffle with the help of parents and local businesses. Milford Bank and People’s Bank donated bicycles and tickets were sold for a quarter apiece. The school raised nearly $1,000.
The following year, the annual holiday fair, the Jingle Bell Junction, raised just under $1,000.
“It’s good for the children to be a part of something, especially during Christmastime,” said parent volunteer Shannon Amato, whose daughter is in the first grade. “They understand that not all kids have as much as them.”
Halina Chodziutko, another parent volunteer, said she often saw students bringing in plastic bags containing their allowances to donate to Save the Children.
“It’s great that the kids get so involved,” Chodziutko said. “They understand that there’s need in the world.”
“The kids really enjoy it,” added Susan Stellato, who also volunteered during the fund-raiser. “The kids got to be helpers during the raffle and handled the money. It was a learning experience.”
For Jahnke, the fact that her students are learning to understand the world around them is very important.
“The children are the ambassadors,” she said. “During the ticket sales, they would come up to me and say, ‘I don’t care if I win the prize, I just want to help save the children.’ Around the holidays, instead of thinking about what they are going to get, the children are thinking about what they are going to give.”
Principal Sean Smyth said the fund-raiser helped the kids develop.
“For these young kids, a big part of social studies is becoming aware of the people around them,” he said. “At 6 years old, they can see that their efforts actually make a difference around the world, and that has the biggest impact.”
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