FCCLA

FCCLA; Family Career and Community Leaders of America, one of Rolla High School’s many clubs committed to community service projects has a heavy load of them during the holiday season. One of them being the head of Rolla High School’s Toys 4 Tots toy drive.

“Toys for Tots is a nation wide toy drive that’s run by the marine corps typically and they have people all over the country that recruit toys to give away.The toys that are collected at the Rolla High School will go to the Rolla Community to children of families in need,” FCCLA’s academic sponsor, Carol White said.

Not only do members of FCCLA get involved with the toy drive, but all students at the Rolla High School are encouraged to help the cause.

“They [G.R.A.C.E] contact FCCLA every year and ask us if we’ll be like the point of contact at the high school but we try to get the whole school involved and try to get all the different advisories to donate. We have a contest with FCCLA sponsoring it and we encourage the different advisories to bring in toys and then the advisory that brings in the most toys, FCCLA will provide some kind of tasty treat for them,” White said.

Not only does FCCLA lead Toys 4 Tots, but they also take part in the Adopt a Family program, providing families with everything they need to have a successful Christmas.

“We adopt two families for the holiday season and we collect gifts from just FCCLA members and then whatever holes we have left that are for things in need, we go out and buy some more gifts so that the family will have a nice Christmas and we wrap them all at the [FCCLA wrapping] party,” White said.

FCCLA officer, Brittany Miller, has been apart of FCCLA’s contribution to the Adopt a Family program for three years now.

“We normally get 1-2 families and we buy clothes, toys, fun gifts, shoes, and some snack items. We then have a fun wrapping party with the whole club and then Mrs. White and Mrs. Cantrell get the gifts to the families. It feels so good to help family’s out. There are people in need and FCCLA is always so generous and it makes me feel so good to know how much people care for others,” Miller said.

Along with their generous donations to the local community, FCCLA members are also the spreaders of holiday cheer with their annual trip to the Parkside Assisted Living Nursing Home.

“We went to the nursing home on December 7th. We went to do fun activities with all of the residents. In years past we sang Christmas carols and did little Christmas games. We do this because sometimes the residents don’t have many people come visit them and so we came to spread joy to all of them. They were so so excited to be with us. It was so rewarding to see the smiles on their faces as we were interacting with them,” Miller said.

Key Club

Another one of Rolla High School’s community service driven clubs is Key Club. Not only are the members in charge of the Courtwarming dance, they also have a packed schedule during the holidays with the Coat Drive and this year’s new addition, The Warming Tree.

“The Coat Drive is district wide and it is at the elementary schools all the way through the high school there are boxes located at the front offices for people to drop off coats. The coats will then be cleaned and then given to students who are in need of coats. If we have coats left over, then we will be given to the coat closet at the first baptist church which is who the district uses to get coats from when needed as well,” Christi Green, Key Club’s academic sponsor, said.

Lacy Hance, the Vice President of Key Club, explains the responisbilites of the Key Club members in order to have a successful coat drive.

“Certain [members] are in charge of certain schools and they go to the different schools and were supposed to set up boxes for kids to donate their coats to and they were in charge of picking up the coats and bringing them back to the high school. We bring them here and they are organized and we give them back to the different schools and they requested certain costs in certain sizes and the rest of them were donated to the Coat Closet,” Hance said.

While you’re sorting through your winter-time clothing, you might be at a loss as to what to do with your outgrown winter accessories. Fear not for Key Club has the perfect solution; The Warming Tree.

“The Warming Tree is where we decorate a Christmas Tree with items such as socks, gloves, stocking hats, [and] scarves, items that people may not have in order to keep them warm. Those items will be collected and again distributed within the district first as needed and then we will look to local charities and possibly the coat closet to help be delivered with those coats as necessary,” Green said.

National Honors Society

National Honors Society; one of Rolla High School’s most prestigious clubs not only has members who are dedicated to their school work but also to helping out their community, starting with the Phelps County Faith Distribution.

“The Phelps County Faith Distribution serves 500-600 families. Walmart provides extra food supplies at the Grace Church here in town. A major part of National Honors Society is the service component and our students have been volunteering at the food distribution. Just this this November, one of our students was helping a lady and it turned out she had been digging in a trash can that morning when someone told her she could go to Grace Church for food. The student was so humbled by the experience and even seeing that there were other high school students that came in need of food. How it all works is on Wednesday night the Walmart truck comes in and volunteers help unload, take inventory, and plan for Saturday. On Saturday, volunteers help distribute the food and push the carts of food to the families’ cars,” Brenda Spurgeon, NHS’s academic sponsor, said.

Rylie Viek, a National Honors Society member, worked at the food distribution on November 19, unknowing of how impactful the experience would be.

“I wasn’t expecting so many people to be there. I didn’t know that many people in our community needed help and there were people there from all walks of life, both young and old.
I was in charge of loading people’s carts and helping them to their cars. That was really interesting because you got to have one on one conversations with people while you’re walking them to their car and I got to make some new friends,” Veik said.

Along with the food distribution, NHS members also decided to be apart of the Adopt a Family program, providing a needy family everything they need to have a great Thanksgiving meal.

“NHS also adopts a family through Grace for Christmas and Thanksgiving. This Thanksgiving we purchased the Thanksgiving meal for a family and with left over money were able to buy them a really nice cutting board. This almost brought the mother to tears because she had never had a cutting board before. This is the kind of service that our kids are going out and doing. They see the need in our own community and learn that we don’t have to go very far to help others. We have opportunities right here in Rolla that allow us to serve and make a difference,” Spurgeon said.

Along with helping people in the community have a nice holiday season, National Honors Society members also do many other service projects during this time of year. The main project being called “Service for Those Who Serve.”

“Service for those who serve was an initiative by the National Honor Society to give back to those in the community who make an impact everyday. Our club decided to honor police officers, firefighters, EMTs, Highway Patrol (Troop I), and new teachers here at RHS. We split the club into separate committees with each assigned to come up with a way to show appreciation towards these groups. Each group came up with a unique way of serving, whether it be through meals, baked goods, or goodie bags. Members set aside time from their day to express gratitude for those who serve our community on a daily basis,” Jacob Cunningham, NHS’ Vice President, said.

Each committee had to brainstorm different ways to show the servers of our community the
appreciation they deserve.

“My particular group was the Highway Patrol based out of Troop I here in Rolla. We decided to make goodie bags for the 67 officers that cycle through that Troop. Along with signed thank you cards from many NHS students, we filled the bags with small snacks and cookies. After we finished, we went to Troop I and presented the gifts. The Patrolmen were very appreciative of the gesture and were thankful for the sentiment,” Cunningham said.

Just like the Highway Patrolmen, our Rolla Community Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs), were also very grateful for NHS’ support.

“My committee had the honor of doing something for the EMTS. We made cookies and brownies for each of the EMTS and delivered them. It was great to see how happy they were when we took the stuff in, they had had a rough night the night before and were thankful for their goodies. The project was a great experience for all of us,” Anna Kaczmerek, National Honors Society Secretary, said.

As were our local firefighters.

“My group had the firefighters and we decided to bake cookies and brownies for them. We put them in bags and wrote thank you notes for the hard work that they do and tied them to the bags. When we delivered them it gave us a very rewarding feeling because of how grateful the firefighters were even though to us it was a simple task. It’s important to do little things like this for the men and women who keep our town safe because it shows how much we appreciate them and acknowledge how difficult their jobs are,” Allison Pernicka, National Honors Society Historian, said.