With six members from each grade in addition to members at large, Westford Academy’s Student Council (STUCO) is the largest branch of student government in the school. Between classic events like the Holiday Bazaar, Polar Plunge, and Spirit Rally, the group dedicates itself to community outreach. This holiday season, that mission has extended beyond the borders of Westford.
STUCO members spent Tuesday, Dec. 16 giving back to their community through a new hands-on toy drive, where they used money from previous fundraisers to select and buy toys at Walmart to donate to the organization Toys for Tots. The event was an attempt to give back this holiday season while also fostering community amongst the student government group.
“It’s such a joyous time of the year. In December, I think everyone deserves to have fun, whether their family can afford it or not,” senior STUCO Media Manager Sharon Lin said. “I think people who are able to afford it and can help out the community for the more underprivileged community should, and I think it’s a great thing.”
The council was randomly split into six smaller teams, each of which were given an envelope with their spendable budget.
Each team was assigned to a specific age range so that STUCO’s collective donations would accommodate all children. The age ranges included one to five-year-olds, five to 10-year-olds, and 10 to 15-year-olds. After arriving at a Walmart in Hudson, New Hampshire to avoid sales taxes, there was approximately 45 minutes for teams to peruse aisles and hand-pick their donations.
As members shopped, many attempted to put themselves in the shoes of the children they were helping.
“Honestly, [I’m] just thinking of how I would feel as a 10-year-old. I’m putting myself in their shoes, seeing what I would want to get during Christmas,” junior STUCO member Amey Naik said. “The gifts that we are picking out are all gifts that we might have wanted when we were younger but weren’t able to get.”
In previous years, STUCO spent the weeks leading up to winter break organizing a group Secret Santa event. According to senior STUCO president Lauren Flaherty, the previous tradition was designed to allow members to get to know each other better in the process of buying gifts, while also fostering a sense of community. But after traditional fundraisers like the Holiday Bazaar began generating an influx of funds, the group wanted to angle their tradition toward the greater good.
“We know how much money we make from the Holiday Bazaar every year, and it’s enough to the point where we can make a difference in someone else’s Christmas,” Flaherty said. “And having the opportunity [to do that] was really an eye-opening moment for us. So we decided this year […] to get toys.”
The organization of funding, formation of groups, and carpools were largely accredited to Lin and Flaherty. According to both of them, the planning process was comparatively easier to other events hosted by STUCO, but the outcome was well worth it.
“I’m just really happy that we actually got this [event] up and running, because it’s kind of hard to do an event the first year,” Flaherty said. “But getting people in student council excited to come here with their friends and do this for the community was just really fun to see.”
As the teams scoured the shelves and debated a choice between stuffed animals or miniature cars, members were able to get to know each other better while reflecting on their roles as community leaders.
“There’s a lot of people out there who are not as privileged as we are in Westford, and I think we should use the money we have in STUCO—because we’re very blessed to have a lot of it—and use it towards something good,” junior STUCO Vice President Raina Chatterjee said.
According to Lin, STUCO’s numbers are helpful when it comes to organizing large events such as the Holiday Bazaar, but make it difficult to create a tight-knit group.
According to multiple STUCO members, establishing a community is a crucial component of outreach, and the group’s leaders strive to integrate team bonding activities throughout the year.
“I think at the beginning [of being a part of STUCO], everyone’s a little bit divided in their friend groups and their grade,” Lin said. “But we need to be a community in order to help the community. So we have to really work together, and we can’t do that if people don’t know each other, which is why we try our best to incorporate bonding activities into these events.”
Ultimately, six shopping carts full of toys were delivered by STUCO members to the Westford Police Department’s site for ROUTES student Meg Norton’s toy drive. Looking forward, members hope to continue this new holiday tradition in the future.
“I really hope that we do continue this tradition, because I think it’s fun to go out with a group and go shopping for a good cause,” Lin said. “And the Secret Santa we used to do was fun, but we didn’t really have that impact. It was just with each other. And I think it’s better to go out and actually make a difference in our community.”
