Editor's Note: Dawn Schmidt is a middle school language arts teacher at St. Stephens Indian School in St. Stephens, Wyoming.
was awarded a Sodexo School Engagement Grant to complete a semester long service project addressing childhood hunger. Students share highlights of their project below.The middle school language arts class at St. Stephens Indian School in St. Stephens, Wyoming is focused on service this semester. Thanks to YSA and the Sodexo Foundation, we have funds for a Semester of Service project. This project includes writing a traditional foods cookbook and starting a school garden. The focus of our service is helping the hungry and the homeless.
One of our community partners is Billie Spoonhunter with Cent$ible Nutrition. We want to help her start a food bank here at the mission. In addition, we are helping Billie to pack Totes of Hope once a week. Billie is partnering with the Food Bank of the Rockies to provide food for St. Stephens families in need.
Former high school principal, Fred Groenke, is helping us start a school garden that we will plant in the spring. In the future, we hope to use the produce from the garden to feed the hungry and the homeless. If there is enough, we want to provide local families with fresh garden produce as well. St. Stephens staff is also helping us with our project. We would like to thank Susan Archer, Marilyn Groesbeck , Ed Trujillo, and Gerri Boesch for their support.
On a broader scale, we want to help the hungry in other nations too. With help from YSA and the Sodexo Foundation, we will reach out to other students and organizations nationally, and internationally. This semester we want to find international partners who we can work with in the future.
Our project completion and celebration is scheduled for the first week of December. At that time we will celebrate our learning this semester, the completion of the cookbook, and the preparation of the garden for planting in the spring. Celebration activities will include cooking a meal for parents and community members, and showing them what we’ve learned this semester.
