The Helping Cardinals Aims To Help Our Community

One of the greatest benefits to Mentor High School is the ability to create a club just for about anything. At Mentor High, there are clubs that involve art, photography, politics, and much more. As it turns out, making a club is probably one of the easiest things to do at Mentor. To make a club, all you have to do is have a topic to center it around, find an advisor, and get it approved. So, over the past summer, I had the great idea of starting my own club – The Helping Cardinals.

Now I know that there are a lot of clubs that do have some volunteering events. However, at Mentor I did not really see many clubs that actually centered around volunteering and charity. Most clubs I saw focused on the ideas of leadership, not the act of giving and the development of compassion. So, last year I came up with the bright idea of starting my own club that centered around charity and giving back to our community.

All throughout my life, I have loved giving back to our community and helping others. Since I was a little kid, my parents instilled the lessons and values of knowing how I can benefit or change someone else’s life through simple acts of kindness. For example, when I was younger, I loved doing acts of charity such as blanket making or cooking dinner for a family in need with my church. However, I soon grew out of the programs that provided these activities. What better way to pass along this idea than creating a club at Mentor High and sharing generosity even more?

So, over the summer I started creating an outline and central idea for my club. My main goal with this club was to create a little community of people who all share one common thing, a wanting to be charitable. With this in mind, I planned out my idea throughout the summer working through knots and holes in the road.

Once the school year came along, I set out to find an advisor. I ended up finding Mr. Matejcic, a teacher interested and excited to advise my club. After talking and planning with Mr. Matejcic, the club kickstarted around the end of October.

Since we launched, we have done many activities that benefit the community. For one of our first activities, we made letters for the elderly – sharing our lives and well-wishes for them in the process. Another activity that we did this December was creating tie blankets for those in need. Even though many of the members had absolutely no idea how to create tie blankets, we ended up with two to give away, and a lot more to make.

In the future, I envision the club doing more activities such as fundraising money to make a little library here at Mentor. Along with that, I see us doing activities such as creating goodie bags for those in need or even potting plants for the elderly in nursing homes.

The group members have already learned so many valuable skills, maybe not tying blankets but many useful skills.

Monica Garza, a member of the Helping Cardinals, says “The club helps with the development of empathy, and leadership skills, and shows how our actions can make a positive impact.”

Seeing how successful this club that I have made is and how it has already helped so many people, even the members, makes me feel accomplished in my goal of spreading the experience of doing charity.

Monica Garza also comments, “The Helping Cardinals has helped and improved the community because it allows students to see the world in different ways.”

If you are looking to participate in bettering our community, consider joining the Helping Cardinals, anybody can join at any time! We meet every other Thursday in B106. There is always an activity to do each week as well as a treat. Along with that, with the Helping Cardinals, you can log one hour of community service each time you come, this will help with your graduation requirements. If you have any questions, contact me, Sarah Blakemore, or Mr. Matejcic. Come to room B106 this Thursday, December 14th after school to participate in this week’s activity, blanket making!