Learning from the actions of children

I make it a point to blog every time someone tells me about another group of children making a wonderful donation to Shepherds of Good Hope. At this time of year, I could probably blog several times a week.

This week, a big thank you goes out to the students of St. Francis of Assisi Catholic School in Orleans. On Tuesday, this group of Grade 1-6 students gathered in their gym and made over 2,000 sandwiches -- 2,090 to be precise. It took them less than a morning.

Sandwiches are so important to us. Although the soup kitchen is open for three meals a day as well as an evening drop-in, hunger doesn't follow a schedule. At any time of the day, someone could come to our doors, hungry and cold, and ask for a sandwich. Thanks to schools like St. Francis of Assisi, we have a sandwich to give them. During our evening drop-in, which is for clients as well as anyone living in the community, we make sandwiches and soup everyone.

There is a lesson here to learn from the students. First, it doesn't take a lot of work to make an impact. Secondly, the children don't question what the impact is of making sandwiches or making some other type of donation. They simply do what they can to help those who are less fortunate than themselves. They are also very eager to soak up what knowledge they can about homelessness. They want to know why people are homeless. They want to know what we do to help the homeless people. More importantly, they want to know what they can do to help the homeless. We can all learn from these children.

In the photo are some of the students who made the sandwiches. Thank you taking them all out to our truck. I know Don and Steve appreciated the extra help.

Students getting a charitable education

One of the fun parts of my job is getting a chance to meet with so many students who come to Shepherds of Good Hope for a tour.

Regular readers of my blog know I'm a big believer in everyone getting a firsthand look at what we do. We're very well known for being a shelter and a soup kitchen. Food and shelter are indeed two very important things Ottawa's most vulnerable men and women need. But we are so much more and over our 32 years, we have moved beyond a soup kitchen.

Typically students come for a tour because they want to do something for us. They want to give back to those most in need, especially as we get closer to the holidays. They visit because they want to see the impact their donation is going to have. Quite often it inspires them to exceed their original goal.

Depending on the size of the class, students get a tour of the soup kitchen, the food and grocery program and we also give a short presentation on our other services.

This morning students from Pierre Savard School and Immaculata High School were here. Thank you so much everyone for coming out.

The power of schools

Every now and then I like to talk about the amount of donations and volunteer time students give to us. This morning we had students from Sacred Heart High School in the kitchen helping with meal preparation. Back at the school, students were also preparing sandwiches. Last year, Sacred Heart High School made more than 5,500 sandwiches for us. Thank you so much to the students at Sacred Heart.

Not to be outdone, students at St. Matthew's High School recently had a canned food drive. Here's a photo below that best shows how much came through our drop-off window. Wow! Amazing. Whether it's feeding the men and women who live in the shelter or helping people in the community who need a little extra, donations like this mean the world to us. Thank you so much.

Last week we had the students in Patrick Dumais' class at College catholique Franco-Ouest donate several boxes of vegetables and fruits, plus more than $150, just in time for Thanksgiving.

I want to say thank you to all the schools who have donated food or made sandwiches so far this year.

It's award season for schools

Even though school has only been in session for a few weeks, it's time to honour two schools with the Ottawa Catholic School Board.

At our annual general meeting Tuesday evening, we celebrated the fundraising efforts of St. Francis of Assisi and Sacred Heart High School. The students of St. Francis of Assisi, an elementary school, made more than 2,000 sandwiches last year and also donated several bags of clothing.

Sacred Heart students were honoured for a third year. Their students made more than 5,500 sandwiches last year and also volunteered in our soup kitchen.

Congratulations to Sacred Heart and St. Francis of Assisi. We appreciate very much the effort you made to help us care for Ottawa's homeless men and women.

This year is shaping up to be another banner year. We're barely a month into the school year and several schools have asked about tours and presentations while others have already indicated they are doing food drives in time for Thanksgiving.

Charlie makes the local newspaper

Charlie, the special six-year-old boy from Renfrew who donated his lemonade stand money to us, was back in the news last week. His hometown newspaper, the Renfrew Mercury, ran a photo on Page 1 followed by a story on an inside page. Click here for the story.

Charlie, you deserve all the accolades you are getting. With the school year just around the corner, I hope you get a chance to talk to your friends at school about how easy it is to help people who have so little.

And speaking of schools, I know it's not what a lot of people think about on such a hot day, but the start of schools is just a few weeks away. This fall, like past years, we'll be reaching out to the schools. So many students and teachers take the time every year to help us either by holding food drives, making sandwiches or raising money.

We're looking forward this year to visiting as many of you as we can. See you in a couple of months.

Another school year is almost over

It's hard to believe we're almost at the end of June. For a lot of Ottawa students, it can't some soon enough. This week will mark the last official week of school for many.

I want to wish everyone a safe and fun-filled summer. During the year, we get hundreds of students in dozens of schools who help us out. Some run food drives, others make sandwiches, groups come to the kitchen to help us prep the noon meal. Recently we had an elementary school raise more than $1,200 for us.

When you're in school, it's not always obvious as to why getting a solid education is important. You'll understand it one day. But there's more to education than classes and textbooks. When schools make the decision to get their students involved in fundraising or volunteerism, they're not just creating a good student. They're creating a well-rounded person who will hopefully continue with the spirit of giving when they become an adult.

I believe part of being a responsible person is giving back to help those people who have so little. One of our most important jobs is to look after one another. Naturally our families are most important to us. They are the ones we want to look after. But we must never forget those vulnerable people who don't get the help they need. They need our help, too.

Who is there to help those people? The Shepherds of Good Hope is there but organizations like ours cannot do it alone. We need volunteers, we need people to donate. And that's why it's so important that students get exposed to volunteerism, so that one day they will carry on the responsibility of looking after those who have so little.

For those of you graduating this year, I wish you the best. For those of you who are back in class in two months (yes, two months!), I look forward to connecting with you again. Your generosity always inspires me.