Love Creek students donate blankets to shelters

By emptying their piggy banks, doing chores at home, and asking family and friends to donate, fifth-graders at Love Creek Elementary School raised $1,700 to purchase blankets for people at local homeless shelters.

Teacher Kelly Hynes said students worked on the project with Blankets of Hope, an educational nonprofit that helps students practice empathy and kindness in a service-learning experience.

“Blankets of Hope is a project I got involved with a few years ago when I heard a few of my former students from New York had begun this Movement of Kindness,” Hynes said. “These gentlemen, Nick and Mike Fiorito, began purchasing blankets, attaching personal notes, and distributing them to the homeless in New York City.”

This year, students had to fundraise to purchase blankets to distribute, Hynes said.  

“Our fifth-graders’ goal was to raise $840 to purchase 120 blankets,” Hynes said. “We ended up raising $1,700 in two weeks. Our families and even some local businesses went above and beyond to help us raise these funds for blankets for the homeless.”

Hynes said the class will donate the additional funds to Blanket of Hope so another school can purchase some blankets.  

On Dec. 17, students gathered in the cafeteria to write notes of kindness and inspiration to attach to the blankets to be distributed to local homeless shelters before Christmas.  

“As the Fiorito Brothers have stated, ‘The secret to living is giving,’” Hynes said. “Teaching is so much more than reading and math. An educator’s role is to provide experiences that encourage children to live powerfully.”