An Afternoon at Wellspring

On Thursday afternoon, sophomores Gabby Assad, Ryan Giunta, Grace Kirby, Jack Landers, Sarah Romanelli, and Lydia Umholtz traveled to Gloucester to drop off Pingree's first round of toys for the Wellspring House Toy Sale. 

While there we were treated to a tour of the beautiful facility - a 400 year old home on the Little River - by staff members Mary Zivkovic and Mary Hardwick. "The Marys" also gave our group some insight about the importance of the toy sale, which Wellspring considers homelessness prevention. 

Many families, in order to make sure that their children have gifts for the holidays, may forgo paying a utilities or rent bill for a month, or might take on debt that becomes crushing. The store at Wellspring allows families to purchase gifts (for about $2 a gift) without having to acquire additional debt that might impact their ability to provide necessities for their children. 

We are so grateful to have the opportunity to work with Wellspring House, and look forward to a continued relationship. Also, thank you to Gabby, Ryan, Grace, Jack, Sarah and Lydia for their kindness, generosity, and warm humor during this adventure. 

Lydia Umholtz and Grace Kirby pose at Wellspring with one the toys donated by a Pingree advisor group

Ryan Giunta carries an armload of gifts while Ms. McCoy helpfully takes a picture

Gabby Assad, Lydia Umholtz, and Jack Landers label and sort toys

Grace and Gabby on the way to Wellspring

Purposeful Giving at Pingree

Every year at Pingree our students, faculty, staff and parents hear about opportunities to donate items, time, talents and money to a host of organizations. While some of these “asks” are based on school-wide efforts (such as the Backpack Drive, annual rummage sale, and “Super Food” drive), many more come from individual students who seek to support organizations with whom they have a long-standing and personal relationship. 

These requests are all worthy, and yet sometimes we feel asked (and obligated) to give more than we are able. Additionally, giving money to a charitable organization (often in exchange for a “dress down” day) does not necessarily push our students to engage meaningfully with that organization or its mission. In other words, in an effort to move Pingree into a model of service learning, asking for and giving money requires neither service nor learning.

Pingree’s Purposeful Giving Fund was established last year with money raised from our first annual rummage sale. The goals in creating this fund were to allow Pingree students to apply for resources that they will donate to organizations with which they have build relationships, to reduce financial asks of community members, and to give students experience in grant writing. This fund is also entirely student generated, meaning that all students are capable of giving to outside organizations simply by volunteering their time to the rummage sale. It is, in essence, a closed loop.

Students are welcome to request funding for a variety of giving opportunities. Some examples are:

·      Sponsorship for a walk or run

·      Donation to an annual drive

·      Purchase of items requested by an organization

·      Sponsorship of an activity for an organization

After applying for (and receiving funds) students will be asked to “report back” to the Pingree Community on how the funds were used. We encourage creative reporting – perhaps a TED Talk, a short movie, a poem read at Coffee House, an online photo exhibit, etc.

The funds will be allocated by the Purposeful Giving Committee, a group of self-appointed students and faculty who will have the pleasure of reading and discussing all of the applications.

For more information or to view an application, please visit the Purposeful Giving page of this blog (tab above.)

Thank you!