It has been one year since Super Storm Sandy destroyed the art room in the basement of St. Rose High School in Belmar, New Jersey. The art teacher, Mrs. Linda Devlin shared photos of the mud and fish-filled room on social networks. I showed these images to my Dryden Elementary first graders who then decided to create our first ever art service project. We called it HeART Houses. They made little houses with a heart out of matt board scraps, painted them, and turned them into pins, magnets, and ornaments to sell to the school community at $5.00 each. Their efforts inspired the Brownies and Girls Scouts to join in and create dozens more. The combined efforts raised $1300 for St. Rose's Art department.
The movie about this service project, narrated by 1st graders, was submitted to the NextVista.org student service project video contest. They were so touched that they donated an additional $200 to St. Rose on our behalf making our total donation $1500.
Mrs. Devlin has received generous donations from other art students doing similar fundraisers and service projects. She just posted new photos of her art room along with her words of thanks. See the video and photos on the Fugleblog.
Pictures of her new classroom and the video here:
http://drydenart.weebly.com/1/post/2013/10/heart-houses-service-project-update.html
Pictures of devastation here:
http://drydenart.weebly.com/1/post/2013/01/our-heart-houses-raised-1275.html
