Jenison students plan fundraiser for North Carolina flood victims

Yahoo

05-03-2025

GEORGETOWN TOWNSHIP, Mich. (WOOD) — Third grade teacher Tina Ryan asked her students at Sandy Hill Elementary a question at the beginning of the school year: How can Sandy Hill help the victims of the North Carolina flooding?
It was part of the school's focus on project-based learning, and it has led to an event that's grown bigger than she could have hoped. The students are planning a benefit concert Friday, March 7, inside the Jenison Junior High gym. The goal is to help students still recovering from the devastation of Hurricane Helene in North Carolina, where flooding destroyed their elementary school.
'We learned about how bad the flooding was in North Carolina, and we talked about how the people were suffering so much,' Ryan explained. 'The kids just really jumped on board with it and they started brainstorming ideas.'
All of the third graders in the school are involved in the project and are learning important skills along the way, especially empathy.
'At third grade age, that's a skill they're just kind of starting to learn. And so it's teaching them how to put themselves in other people's shoes,' Ryan explained. They're also learning about teamwork, compromise and organization.
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Maddie Koning and Isaac Sonka are two of the students involved in the project, and their excitement is clear.
'I was actually the one who came up with the concert idea,' Isaac declared, explaining how they worked in teams to brainstorm ideas.
Maddie's group presented a plan for refreshments.
'My group was a lemonade stand, so that's what we're going to be doing at the concert,' she said. 'And there's going to be food and a used book sale.'
The kids graded all of their ideas using the 'N.U.F.' approach, deciding if the idea was new, useful and feasible.
'For mine, I remember it was for new, 9.5; for useful, 8.5; and feasible, 8.5,' Isaac recalled.
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The concert idea ended up being the winner, but the class found a way to incorporate the other team's ideas, too — hence the book sale, lemonade stand and bake sale. Local cover band The House Cats volunteered to perform at the concert, which will also feature talented staff members in the district and the Sandy Hill third graders singing 'We Are the World.'
The kids have been able to put a face to their project. They joined a Zoom call last week with the students in North Carolina who will benefit from the concert. They talked for about 30 minutes about their likes and dislikes, what their schedules are like and what the Sandy Hill kids have planned.
'They really liked it. They liked all of our ideas, and we talked about this fundraiser,' Maddie said.
Isaac added that it made him 'really happy because I was seeing the exact people that we were going to help.'
The kids in North Carolina lost their building to flooding, missed weeks of school and are now attending class in two different buildings. They haven't been able to do any of the normal, fun activities in their school year, so the money raised from the concert will go toward sending them all on a field trip.
Doors open at 6 p.m. Friday at the Jenison Junior High gym, with a suggested donation of $5 per person. Even if you can't make the concert, organizers say you can still donate using cash or Venmo (@SandyHillFamilyConnection) with the label '3rd Grade Gives.'
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