*Updated January 11, 2:43pm
While many folks take Monday, January 17 off for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, John Stanford families will “Make it a Day On — Not a Day Off!” Wallingford neighbors are invited to participate in the MLK Day of Service activities at John Stanford International School from 10 am until 2 pm. The volunteers will be meeting on the school’s playground, where they will be weeding, digging, and spreading wood chips. The playground is just south of the school building, at 4057 5th Avenue NE. You can e-mail Barb Burill at [email protected] or sign up at the United Way MLK Day of Service site by clicking here.
*Update: Erica Ellis, over at United Way of King County, asked us to include a link to the official MLK Day website to show several other volunteer projects that are also taking place next Monday. For more information, visit: http://www.uwkc.org/ways-to-volunteer/mlkday/
During the volunteer day of service, Scott Sowle, founder of Redeeming Soles will also be on-site at the John Stanford playground, hosting a shoes and socks drive. Redeeming Soles is a non-profit organization that Scott began after living on the streets and seeing how something so important as adequate footwear and foot care was virtually nonexistent among the less fortunate. He’s asking for shoes (of any kind–even flip flops, so long as they’re new) and socks that are gently used, without holes or mud and with the shoelaces intact. If you have shoes to donate, please tie the laces together or secure them with a rubber band. New shoes can be left in their boxes.
Little known fact: In the original draft of “I Have A Dream”, MLK asked that his four children be judged not by the color of their skin, but by the “cleanliness of their tetherballs” and the “evenness of their woodchips”, so this initiative is spot on with the day of service concept.
While I think doing *anything* as service on MLK is better intentioned than taking the day off, take a look at that photo of the shiny and well kempt JSIS. Is this really where the greatest need is? Isn’t this a little self-serving for a top-rated school in an affluent community? I mean I am fine with taking care of your own school, but I think tying it to MLK Day is a bit disingenuous.
There’s a whole list of projects on the Make it a Day On link that more directly benefit people who need help, even if you want to stay in 98103
Wow, ABSSN….I really think you could have made your point without slamming JSIS and the people who are trying to coordiante this day of service. Public schools, even in affluent areas, are powered largely by volunteers. And while JSIS does draw kids from an affluent area, there are also kids who go to school there who receive free lunch, and kids who are bused in from other areas to attend the BOC program which helps children new to the country learn some English and figure out our school system.
If you feel that there is a cause more worthy than public education, by all means go volunteer there! If you want to advertise volunteer opportunities for other Wallingford non-profits, please do it! But please recognize that even in this neighborhood, public schools don’t have surplus in their budgets, and that basic improvements to the school don’t happen without community support.
BTW, I would also suggest that you really *look* at that playground sometime and appreciate how little space, how little greenery and how little play equipment there is, especially considering the numbers of children who play there every day. The committee of people who is trying to improve that playground and the volunteers who are out there actually putting in the labor to help keep the costs down (part of which is YOUR tax money) should be supported, not put down. As the mom of a kindergartener at JSIS, I am extremely grateful for their efforts!
I don’t think there are many causes more worthy than public education, but I don’t see how spreading woodchips at one of the top schools in the region equates with furthering public education. If that’s the secret to having everyone match JSIS’s performance, I’m happy to haul a truck load down to the other side of the ship canal. 🙂
(Btw: the JSIS free/reduced lunch is significantly lower than many other elementary schools, only 17% compared to 30-40% or more at other schools in Seattle).
Lastly, as I said I have no problem with getting the parents together to spruce up their children’s school. And I really do think it’s great JSIS have such an involved and active school community. I wish all schools did. I just don’t think that sprucing up your own backyard (when it’s not that bad in comparison to others in the district, and when it directly benefits your own kids) in the name of MLK is appropriate.
Well, trying to figure out what is or is not appropriate in the name of MLK is a little bit like trying to interpret the bible. And rather than split hairs, I would rather encourage anyone who feels moved to spend their holiday working on a volunteer project to do that! I would imagine that MLK would much prefer that people do some kind of service rather than just sleep late.
And anyone can volunteer to help out JSIS, not just people with kids going there. For example: people with kids who may go there someday and want to meet the other families, kids who went there and want to go help out, and people who live nearby and just think that lending a hand sounds like fun.
Perhaps a nice,safe project like spreading woodchips will be the “gateway drug” for some of those volunteers to spend future MLK days working on other volutneer projects(for example, ones that would meet your criteria of service).
This is Barb the contact for the JSIS project. Just wanted to post an update that the United Way web site time slots are filled, so anyone who wants to help out can email me at [email protected] to sign up.
And we do have lots of jobs besides spreading wood chips. My personal favorite is digging up blackberry roots on a 1:1.5 slope, but that doesn’t always appeal to everyone.
I would be more than happy to organize a group of volunteers to work at another Seattle public school on MLK Day 2012. Or before – no need to wait for MLK Day to make a difference.