Recently, there existed an element of the fantastical inside Stuart Country Day School’s serpentine parlor.
By Bindu Bansinath
Recently, there existed an element of the fantastical inside Stuart Country Day School’s serpentine parlor. As Monday compounded into Tuesday and the work-week beyond, students piled the parlor high with brownie tins. The image was something akin to presents underneath a Christmas tree, only with the addition of aluminum.
In fact, the advent of homemade brownies — along with the fresh bread, fruits, boxed foods and toiletries that followed — was nothing outside the norm for the Stuart community. Each tin was a donation for the Loaves and Fishes initiative, an annual service project that began under the guidance of Barbara Anne Cagney. Now, 30 years later, Madame Elizabeth Amir carries the tradition onwards. This project, however, like so many others characteristic of Stuart, is also contingent upon the participation of its students. And the hardworking liaison between faculty, service and students is none other than the Upper School’s very own service committee, Outreach.
Comprised of a small band of girls spanning freshmen to seniors, Outreach is an application-based committee that brings the Sacred Heart goal of social awareness and action to a new level. The committee is not only constantly thinking of ways to extend helping hands into the community (trips to Sandy relief sites as well as beach clean-ups have been points of discussion) but also of ways to insert students into the communities they aim to help.
For example, not only did Outreach collect donations for Loaves and Fishes, but they also served at the St. Mary’s Cathedral on Saturday, Jan. 25. Kayla Jones ‘14, one of the student heads of the committee, expressed her enthusiasm over Stuart’s incredible support of the Loaves and Fishes initiative, “… It was amazing to see how many Stuart families were willing to donate their time to serving meals on Saturday and we plan to keep the service going!”
In this sense, Stuart’s Outreach committee is decidedly unique. Its focus is not charity; rather, it is community. Whether through work at food banks around Thanksgiving or Fair Trade sales hosted in previous years, the students of Outreach know that community is an idea more profound than the simple motions of some-give-and-some-take. Service is as much about the individual who serves as the individual who receives, and to try and differentiate the two is to mess with the symbiosis of community.
Outreach, as they busy themselves planning hot meals in Central Park, trips to the SAVE animal shelter, and more, understand this idea. They understand that this is our community, and with a great deal of dedication, creativity, humor and hands, they’re willing to build it, mend it and, most of all, love it.
Bindu Bansinath is a senior and Executive Council president at Stuart Country Day School of the Sacred Heart.