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Catholic News Herald

Serving Christ and Connecting Catholics in Western North Carolina

021519 students joyWINSTON-SALEM — Each Christmas, St. Leo School’s fourth-grade class adopts a family.

They hold a bake sale every November to raise money for gifts. On “Cyber Monday,” students shop online to find the best deals.

They wrap the project up by, well, wrapping the gifts as a class.

The class learned several lessons through this project last Christmas.

Teamwork, technology and math skills all came into play as they worked together to stretch their bake sale money as far as possible.

The most important lesson learned was the joy in giving to others.
— Melissa Kinsley

SALISBURY — “It is better to give than to receive!”

Sacred Heart students and families were recently recognized for their generosity and kindness with their local Rowan County Toys for Tots Collection. Overall, the school community collected 754 new toys for needy children to help make their Christmas brighter.

This follows right along the school’s Virtues Program of Kindness and Generosity.

The idea came from fourth-grader Aidan Melton, 9, who has been volunteering with the organization since he was 5. He asked Principal Tyler Kulp if he could take what they’d been learning about showing kindness to others a step further with a toy drive. As to why he wanted to extend the idea of giving to others to his classmates, Aidan simply said he likes helping people. He added that he was proud of his classmates for helping give to others.

Aidan’s goal is that “everybody could have a little Christmas,” this year.

“Our strength is in what we can do,” Kulp said. “Our kids are trying to give back.”

This isn’t the first time students stepped up to support the community. In November, Father John Eckert and Kulp had a friendly contest as to who the students thought grew the best beard during No Shave November. The students raised over $840 in change. The money was donated to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

— Robin Fisher and The Salisbury Post