Student Volunteering at The Foundation School of Montgomery County

While our schools work hard on their assignments during the summer session, our students with emotional disabilities are still making time to volunteer in their local communities. Students at The Foundation School of Montgomery County (FSMC) are earning their service learning (SSL) hours in a variety of creative ways. This month, a group of students took a trip to Habitat for Humanity Restore, a nonprofit retail outlet that specializes in the resale of quality and gently used furniture, antique appliances and building supplies, to help clean and organize their shop before opening hours. The staff thanked our students saying, “Thank you to these incredible students from The Foundation Schools for their hard work! Every volunteer in our Habitat Metro Maryland ReStores helps to make affordable housing a reality in Metro MD.” In addition to helping local nonprofits, our students also assisted a local farm by cleaning their fences. As a reward for their hard work, they got to brush and pet the horses! 

 

 

We are grateful for our partners at the Manna Food Center and Meals on Wheels for allowing students to earn their SSL hours by labeling, organizing and distributing food to individuals in need in Montgomery County. Students also received other opportunities to distribute food with the Silver Spring Distribution Center, who feeds hundreds of families with food insecurity in the Silver Spring area. Outside of general volunteer opportunities, FSMC’s Service Learning Club is also providing amazing service opportunities that students can complete in school. Every week, students in the Service Learning Club create a weekly newsletter with information about events happening in school, words of appreciation to their teachers, and tips for students to stay focused in class. This is a great opportunity for our students to practice important values like responsibility, consistency and positive social interactions. Service Learning Club members also help beautify our community by cleaning up trash in our area and identifying areas of need in their community so that they can create more volunteer opportunities for fellow students. 

 

 

We are so proud of the incredible work our students are doing to earn their SSL hours. Service-learning has been embraced in Maryland as an effective, experiential instructional strategy that allows students to apply what they learn in the classroom to the real world. It makes the curriculum relevant and accessible to students through hands-on activities that help students better understand how their communities work, how they can become actively involved in making community improvements, and how to tackle difficult community problems. We can’t wait to see how our students at FSMC will continue to be involved in our communities this upcoming school year. If you would like to partner with our schools, please email us at development@foundationschools.org.