The basketball courts are clear of ice, bird feeders are
hanging in the park and kids are going door-to-door selling baked goods.
Kids from the Michele Heights community worked on improving
their own neighbourhood during March Break with help from the Interact Clubs of
Bell High School in Nepean and Mackenzie High School in Deep River, Ont. The
Interact Club, which is the high school version of the Rotary Club, adapted the
Who Is Nobody program to condense it to three days from its typical full school
year.
WIN is a character education program that builds
self-confidence in kids by getting them involved in charitable projects. The
kids start with a doll with no character, called Nobody. As they complete their
projects in the community, they add items to Nobody to represent their work.
For example, the kids put plastic gloves on Nobody to
represent the work they did to pick up garbage in the community.
“We asked them what they wanted to do in the community and
then we thought of projects that would go well,” says Victor Malkov, a member
of the Bell High School Interact Club.
The kids also wrote letters to the city asking for help with
overflowing dumpsters in the community. Other projects included a mobile
fundraising bake sale, recycling milk containers into painted bird feeders and
de-icing the basketball court.
“If it wasn’t cleaned
up, (the ice) would melt and there would be water on the court,” says Hibo
Mousa, a Michele Heights residents who participated in
the program.
Hibo says she has been waiting all winter to play
basketball.
“We love playing basketball,” says Awo Elmi, another
participant from Michele
Heights.
The Interact youth also asked the kids what characteristics
are important to being a good person. Then they brainstormed ways to dress
Nobody to show those traits, including a school backpack for intelligence and
an IPod playing the song Respect.
“We were creating stuff for him like backgrounds and shoes,”
Hibo says.
“We gave him a career,” Awo says, adding that Nobody will be
a construction worker.
Ben Fleming, another Interact member, explains the students
volunteered to help at Michele Heights when a trip to El Salvador was delayed due to political
turmoil during the elections there.
“Our club is active in the Who is Nobody program,” says Bill
Robinson, a member of the Rotary Club of Nepean-Kanata, which sponsors the Bell
Interact Club. “We have an Interact Club, we’re active in Michele Heights
and we had time in March Break. It all came together.”
The Interact students are in grades 9 to 12 and the Michele Heights students are in grades 5, 6 and
7.
margaret.sambol@nepeanthisweek.com