A group of students from a Santa Maria junior high school planned a community service project to help clean up a local beach following Memorial Day Weekend.
An eighth grade AVID class from Arellanes Junior High School in Santa Maria took to the beach Tuesday morning, but this trip wasn’t for surf and relaxation; it was for a little beautification.
“I think it's a good way to have fun and hang out with your friends and do some volunteer work for the area,” said Aaron Gonzalez, an eighth grader at Arellanes Junior High School.
AVID stands for Advancement Via Individual Determination. The purpose of the program is to prepare students for secondary education and to help them figure out their future career paths.
“I'm super proud of them,” said Nina King, a teacher at Arellanes Junior High School. “One of the things that we were trying to get them to understand is that even though they're in eighth grade, they're looked at as young kids. I wanted them to understand that their voice matters and what they do matters.”
The students brainstormed a few possible community service projects, and helping the environment got the vote. They chose the day after a busy holiday weekend to help clean up Grover Beach.
“I think it's awesome that they chose to do this and keep our beaches clean, and serve not just Santa Maria where they live, but the surrounding community and where they call home,” said Jennifer Danowitz, a teacher at Arellanes Junior High School.
“Memorial Day weekend was yesterday. There will be a lot of leftover trash. We want to make sure none of the seagulls or any of the animals choke or die from the leftover trash,” said Gonzalez.
Community service cleaning up a local beach; one of the last hurrahs for the class before heading to high school.
If you want your child to be enrolled in an AVID class, check with your school’s administration to see if a course is offered.
