By Lea Kahn, Staff Writer
If there is a need for a volunteer or someone to lend a helping hand, Nelle Evans is right there.
The 13-year-old Lawrence Middle School student has been volunteering her time whether it is organizing a food drive or working with young children for almost as long as she can remember, beginning with her days as a Girl Scout.
That’s why it should not be a surprise that Nelle has been named one of New Jersey’s top two youth volunteers for 2013 by The Prudential Spirit of Community Awards, which is a nationwide program that honors young people for outstanding acts of volunteerism.
The Prudential Spirit of Community Awards is conducted by Prudential Financial in partnership with the National Association of Secondary School Principals. It is the United States’ largest youth recognition program based solely on volunteer service.
For her efforts, Nelle will receive $1,000, an engraved silver medallion, and an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington, D.C., in May, where she will join her counterparts from across the nation and the District of Columbia for four days of national recognition events.
Although Nelle has been volunteering since her elementary school days, it never occurred to her to enter such a competition. The mother of a 1st-grader whose soccer team she coaches told Nelle’s mother about the Prudential Spirit of Community Awards.
”I had to write an essay about how many hours I have done with community service and what work I have done,” Nelle said. “I was a little surprised. I didn’t realize how much it added up when I looked at the list. You don’t realize how much it adds up to until you look at the big picture.”
One of Nelle’s earliest volunteer efforts was helping to organize the Souper Bowl of Caring which is a food drive for a local food pantry when she was a student at the Lawrence Intermediate School. She helped to recruit volunteers and publicized the event during the three years that she attended the grades 4-6 school.
As a 7th-grader last year, Nelle organized “Teens for Jeans” to gather jeans for teenagers who cannot afford them. She collected nearly 350 pairs of jeans and donated them to HomeFront, which is a Lawrence-based nonprofit agency that helps the homeless and working poor.
Nelle is the first to admit that she loves working with young children. For the past three years, she has been involved with the Safety Town program that teaches children about swimming pool safety, fire safety and how to safely walk to school.
”They need to know how important it is to keep safe. I went through Safety Town when I was little. I really feel it helped me a lot,” she said.
Nelle is also involved in sports. She helps to coach a soccer team made up mostly of 1st-grade girls. She has helped run a clinic for girls in grades 1-4 who want to be goalkeepers a position that she has played on soccer teams.
”I stayed with the little girls. I want to be a role model. You don’t see that many girl goalkeepers,” Nelle said.
To provide moral support to a friend who has been diagnosed with cancer, Nelle helped to organize a drive to distribute lime green shoelaces for the basketball sneakers worn by the girls’ basketball teams at Lawrence Middle School, Lawrence High School and the Lawrence Township Recreation Department.

