Rhodes Students Wear Hats for Earthquake Relief

Fourth graders at Rhodes Elementary came up with a novel idea to raise funds for victims of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami:  wear hats for a day. School policy bans students from wearing hats, but for such a good cause the rules were bent.  

The catch? Each student that wore a hat donated $1.00 to the American Red Cross Japanese Earthquake Relief Fund. After hearing about the fundraiser, Alan Shawn Feinstein, the philanthropist, agreed to match dollar for dollar all funds raised.

With all grades and faculty pitching in on the effort the school was able to raise a total of $316.81, according to Amy Rojek, a teacher that helped to coordinate the effort.  With Feinstein's matching funds the total money raised came to $632.62.

Rhodes students were moved to action after learning about the earthquake and tsunami during class, said Principal Jim Zanfini.  He said they weren't exposed to the harshest aspects of the devastation, but were given an idea of the hardship by reading some of the lighter news articles

"I had many kids from many grade levels motivated to help," said Zanfini.

The fourth graders at the school were instrumental to the effort, according to Zanfini.  They approached him with the idea, gave up their recess to plan it and created posters and school announcements to promote the event.

Fourth grade teachers Mrs. Rojek, Mrs. Weber and Mrs. Cormier helped to coordinate the students' efforts, said Zanfini.

On Friday, students came wearing a variety of hats.  There were the obligatory Red Sox, Patriots and Bruins caps.  There was even a Yankee one.  Then there were those a little off-beat, like the lobster cap and a Mexican wrestler mask.

The day was a little bit of fun to benefit a serious cause.

"They really have a sense of doing good for others," said Zanfini of the students.