Community Car Wash and Supply Drive for the Children of Pine Ridge Reservation
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The Lakota Pine Ridge Children's Enrichment Project, a nonprofit corporation Founded by SHS Graduate Maggie Dunne, is running its annual Supply Drive for Lakota Children living on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. SHS Pine Ridge Reservation Aid Club (headed by senior Katie Colella), the Scarsdale Congregational Church Youth Action Committee and SHS’s premier a cappella group, For Good Measure, will host a Community Car Wash and Awareness Benefit on October 14, 2012, from 1-3 PM on the grounds of the Scarsdale Congregational Church, to rally community support for the project. Community members are urged to bring items for Lakota children to the car wash, which will also have awareness tables, silent auction, bake sale, refreshments, volunteer opportunities and entertainment.
Through October 20, 2012, Lakota Children’s Enrichment is collecting new or barely used and clean:
- Children's Coats
- Children's Snow Boots
- Waterproof Gloves
- Warm Outerwear
- Books (especially any series of books)
- New or barely used toys (for Halloween and Holiday parties)
- New (or very barely used) running shoes of all sizes (for two schools that are trying to implement proper sports programs for their students grades K-8).
Donations may be dropped off (or brought to the October 14 car wash) at the Scarsdale Congregational Church Parish House, One Heathcote Road, lobby (Red brick building at intersection of Heathcote and Post Roads) by October 20, 2012
OR at Scarsdale High School Post Road entrance (boxes in hallway).
Pine Ridge Reservation is home to the Oglala Lakota Nation and is one of the poorest regions in the USA. Today, mail is not delivered to residences, cell phones, Internet access and computers are not affordable for most, water access and mass transportation are limited, schools struggle to keep teachers, drop out rates are as high as 70%, and health care and housing are sub-standard. The tribe reports a population of between 28,000-35,000 with an average live span of 48 for men and 53 for women; infant mortality rates are as high as parts of the “developing world.”
On September 11 2012, United Nations Human Rights expert James Anaya issued a report on America’s indigenous communities and concluded that unless genuine movement is made toward reconciling misdealings and continuing harms, "the place of indigenous peoples within the US will continue to be an unstable, disadvantaged and inequitable one, and the country’s moral standing will suffer."
The following is an excerpt of a letter published in the UN’s report, which was sent from a child living on an adjacent Reservation.
“Life here is very hand to mouth. Out here, we don’t have the finer things. You get what you get and you don’t throw a fit. And I’m going to be honest with you, sometimes I don’t eat. I’ve never told anyone this before, not even my mom, but I don’t eat sometimes because I feel bad about making my mom buy food that I know is expensive. And you know what? Life is hard enough for my mom, so I will probably never tell her. My parents have enough to worry about. I do not know what you can do, but try your very best to help us. Please help us. We can do this. Yes we can!”
Last year the Scarsdale community sent 5000 pounds of donations of mostly new items to the children of Pine Ridge Reservation and the Fall drive supply provided clothing, boots and warm outerwear to thousands of children and families. Lakota Children’s Enrichment thanks the Scarsdale community for its continuing support.
You can follow Lakota Pine Ridge Children’s Enrichment’s efforts on Facebook, Twitter (@Lakota_Children) or its blog at http://lakotakids.blogspot.com/ .
Halloween Happenings in Scarsdale
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The Scarsdale Parks and Recreation Department will be holding their Annual Halloween Window Painting Contest and Parent/Child Halloween Window Painting program on Sunday, October 21st from 9:00 am – 4:00 pm. All students who live in or attend public or private schools in Scarsdale in grades 1 – 10 are eligible to participate in this event.
In addition to the window painting programs, there will be a Costume Parade held in the Village streets by Chase Park. The parade line up begins at 2:45 pm in front of Chase Park. The parade will start at 3:00 pm. Special entertainment and refreshments will be provided after the parade. All Pre-E and Elementary School children are welcome to participate in the costume parade.
The deadline to participate in the Halloween Window Painting programs is Wednesday, October 10th. Please register online at http://reconline.scarsdale.com .
For questions, call the Recreation Department at 722-1160.
Y.E.S. Matches Students and Jobs
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Youth Employment Service of Scarsdale, or Y.E.S., is open for business. For over 40 years, Y.E.S. has been providing, at no charge, a jobs clearinghouse service for Scarsdale youth and Scarsdale businesses and residents.
Y.E.S. matches bright, reliable youth 14 years old and up with employers in homes and businesses in Scarsdale looking for help on a one-time, short-term or longer-term basis. Jobs run the gamut, from babysitting, tutoring, arts and crafts help, computer and office work to catering and birthday party help, gardening, leaf raking, snow shoveling and painting. Through its website, employers and students can post and access job opportunities online 24/7.
In addition to the website, Y.E.S. maintains an office at the high school, open Monday through Friday 11:30 AM to 1:30 PM during the school year.
Y.E.S. is not affiliated with the high school or funded by the school district or any PTA or other organization. Y.E.S. is a stand alone, nonprofit community organization run entirely by parent volunteers and dependent solely on donations from the community to cover its costs to provide its services, primarily for website maintenance. Donations of any size are welcome and may be given online, at http://scarsdale.ny.hs-ses.com, or by mail to Y.E.S. at 2 Brewster Road. Anyone wishing to volunteer a couple of hours once every few weeks at the Y.E.S. office at the high school should contact yes.office.scarsdale@gmail.com.
Through its unique service, Y.E.S. offers the young people in our community the experience and responsibility of holding a job while helping local employers fill their needs.
New Playground Dedicated at Fox Meadow School
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At the Fox Meadow picnic on the evening of September 10, a new playground was dedicated at the school. The ribbon-cutting ceremony was the culmination of “Operation Blacktop,” a year-long project by Mr. Besancon’s fifth grade class who researched playground equipment, polled students on what they liked and raised close to $2,000 to fund the project. These funds were supplemented with donations from the Fox Meadow PTA and the Fox Meadow Neighborhood Association to pay for the new equipment and build the new space.
Fox Meadow Principal Duncan Wilson greeted the fifth graders who returned to the school for the dedication, saying, “It’s not just test scores and grades you remember … it’s the kind of work you did with Mr. Besancon.” In an email, Wilson said, “We are very proud of the students' efforts. To me, it represents a great example of real life problem solving- the kind of thinking and communicating that we want our children doing.”
The Secret to a Great College Essay
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This year, for the second time in my ten-year career as a college essay advisor, one of my students not only got into his top-choice school but also received a letter from the admissions committee specifically complimenting the strength of his essay. (This student received his letter from Tulane; my prior student received his letter from Yale.) These letters prove what college preparation companies all assert: the essay is among the top three factors in college admission, after GPA and SAT/ACT scores. Sadly, I will soon be leaving this line of work to begin my career in law, but before I depart, I would like to share the top three strategies I have developed that make a college essay worthy of a special letter from the admissions committee:
1) Hook the reader:
College admissions officers read dozens of essays every day, and hundreds of essays every week. If you don’t grab their attention within the first thirty seconds, you won’t grab it at all. Thus, without a good hook, a great essay may never receive the attention it deserves.
Last year’s essay that received the letter of praise started like this: “My favorite author, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., once wrote, ‘The most exquisite pleasure in the practice of medicine comes from nudging a layman back to safety again.’ If that is true, then the doctor who saved my life must surely have taken great pleasure in his work.” And with that hook, I knew that the great essay that followed would not go to waste.
2) Take a risk with your topic:
My students and I have written great essays together about their stuttering, their high school popularity, their tan skin, and their loneliness as over-achievers. In a world where too many students write about their successes and achievements, with my help, a student wrote a great essay about his disappointment in his high school debate career. And all of these students gained admission to top schools.
My experience proves the old saying that with greater risk comes greater reward. Admissions officers see countless essays touting the brilliance that is already apparent on paper. Why bore them with redundancy? A display of thoughtfulness, humor, and, above all, originality is a sure-fire way to make the essay count.
3) Use your own voice:
Too often I have seen a student’s natural, authentic-sounding prose stilted by a parent’s or an English teacher’s re-write. College admissions officers are not dummies: they know when an essay has been re-written by an adult. And when an essay sounds forged, it will lose all its points no matter how good it is.
For that reason, I always try to keep as much of my students’ natural voices present in the essay as possible. This effort always requires a continual, collaborative effort with the student, but the extra work that I put in pays dividends in the ring of the prose. There is nothing wrong with seeking help, but make sure that the help does not in fact hinder.
If you follow these three pieces of advice, you will be well on your way to a winning college essay. You may even receive a letter that says so!
Sam Hershey has worked as an SAT/ACT tutor and college essay adviser for over ten years. He holds a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania and, as of last May, a J.D. from Columbia Law School. He will leave the world of tutoring in November to pursue his career in law but is available until then for tutoring and essay-writing assistance. He can be reached at samhershey@gmail.com.
