Teens Prove Most Outstanding Service to Others Possible – Even While Isolated by Pandemic

PITTSBURGH, PA (PittsburghNewsWire.com) — Trinity High School Students In Action (SIA) team, known as Trinity Leadership Committee, from Washington, PA, has earned the 2021 Pennsylvania Students In Action Award For Most Outstanding Service to Others, the Commonwealth’s top recognition for youth leadership in public service. This award is presented by Multiplying Good Pittsburgh’s Students In Action (SIA) program: a unique youth service, leadership and recognition program that supports, trains, and empowers today’s youth to be leaders, problem solvers, entrepreneurs, and impactful global citizens. The Trinity team also takes home top SIA honors for earning a 2021 Regional Gold Banner for their service and the 2021 Regional Award for Best Blog describing the service work of their team during passing school year.

 

Jodi Klebick, Multiplying Good Pennsylvania Executive Director, said, “Multiplying Good is recognizing the Trinity teens for achievement of their service leadership project The Trinity Family, in response to the pandemic affecting so many members of their community, including many classmates.”

 

“The Trinity Students In Action team addressed the impacts of COVID-19 on a multifaceted approach: from isolation, to job loss, to food insecurity, and more. This remarkable group of 12 student leaders worked sometimes from school, sometimes online from home, and always socially distanced but community minded. They planned ‘independent activities to maintain the basic needs in a family: ample food, warm clothing, personal care products, feeling safe, being healthy and inspired, and nurturing their children and pets as applicable, while also teaching young people to have a voice in our democracy,” said Klebick. “Working with a variety of organizations, the team’s goal was to gather and distribute items for as many families in need, easily accessible through school drives, and readily usable and accessible, safe, and easy to store, while also providing additional opportunities for others to engage in public service.”

 

In the spring of 2020, the team took an Umbrella approach to service that kept going into 2021 (see this video). For example, the team already knew that their district was running at about 50% free/reduced lunch, and for two years the high school also provided free dinners four days a week for 18-year-old and younger students. So, the team helped to include free breakfasts and lunches for students throughout the 2020 summer and is still doing so this summer. Despite huge challenges, they were also able to support other families in the community, many without work, by collecting and distributing over 750 food items; 700 personal care items; 256 gloves, scarves and hats; 121 children’s’ books; and 78 pet items; as well as hosting 3 blood drives and writing 2,500 cards for senior citizens and veterans isolated by the pandemic. In addition, they also won the Governor’s Civic Engagement Award, presented by the Pennsylvania Departments of State and Education, which celebrates the efforts of our high school students to educate, engage, and inform their fellow students about how to get involved in the voting process. All told, through Students In Action, the team impacted 6,000 individuals, engaged 30% of their student body and over 260 volunteers, and completed more than 1,200 hours of service – all during COVID-19. 

 

In late May, the team competed against other Students In Action teams at Multiplying Good Pennsylvania’s annual Public Service Pitch Day and earned the top honor, allowing them to participate in the organization’s national recognition event this June against other youth teams from across the country for national Bronze, Silver or Gold Status at the 2021 virtual National Jefferson Awards ceremonies coming in September.  Students In Action is provided locally at no cost to youth participants or schools by Multiplying Good, who is raising funds for the new school year now through a virtual walkathon at https://bit.ly/Walk4Good.

 

Also winning a local Gold Banner for the Pittsburgh region was a new Students In Action (SIA) team of middle school students from Penn Hills Charter School of Entrepreneurship, who formed a team for their first time during the pandemic. Their student-led service project was to show appreciation for their teachers in a creative way by getting 50 students to record their greatest lessons learned from their teachers during the pandemic. SIA operates in Pennsylvania as well as communities across the country, delivering robust programming for youth and on-the-ground impact where it’s needed most.