Operation Day's Work (ODW) 2002 Student Activities:

Broad Meadows Middle School, Quincy, Massachusetts, Tuesday, April 16th

Thirty ODW students met for months on Friday afternoons to design a full day's work on April 16, 2002, to beautify our city's historic public library's grounds. We even planted a garden outside the children's room windows. All 580 plants and a tree were donated by local business people. In the morning we raked and planted. At lunch, a local business delivered free pizza and soda for 30 ODW members. ODW members wore the student-designed ODW hooded t-shirts with the names on the back of the countries we've helped and American flags on the sleeves to remember the victims of September 11th. In the afternoon, in the library's Community Room, we presented a "Child Labor Symposium" free and open to the public. The "symposium" was our "International Day" piece. Fourteen students spoke about problems and solutions children face around the world. Instead of talking doom and gloom, we offered 6 actions people could take today to help children in developing countries. One of those, of course, was Operation Day's Work-USA. We explained how it works, how to start it at a school, how it helps children and how it helps the U.S. The money raised from this project goes to our ODW project, A Glimmer of Hope.

Hanover High School, Hanover, New Hampshire (Newton School invited), April 26, 2002

The International Day activity was an Ethiopian Slide Show by John Layton, who is photographer with A Glimmer of Hope.

Shorewood High School, International Week, May 13th.

Below is a daily list of the scheduled activities for International Week.

Monday - We'll start off our education week with announcements and start our Ethiopia Trivia game. Trivia Question - Since Ethiopia is a land locked country what 5 countries border it? Trivia Answer - Eritrea, Kenya, Sudan, Djibouti, Somalia Trivia Prizes - 1st Prize $15 to Schwartz; 2nd Prize Movie passes; 3rd Prize gift certificate to a coffee shop (Altera, or Starbucks) Prizes will be given to the top three winners.

Tuesday - We'll have an ice cream sundae sale at lunch (for this we each need to bring in a topping (or two) and some money to buy ice cream. Trivia Question - Ethiopia is slightly less then half of what state? a.Texas b. Colorado c. Alaska. Trivia Answer- a. Texas

Wednesday - We'll have our Ethiopia cultural day. At lunch we'll have a bake sale in the front hall and Ethiopian music on the front lawn. In the front hall there will also be free info and Ethiopia pins (like the black ones that we had from Sept 11 but with the Ethiopian flag colors). We can also use chalk to write Ethiopia facts on the sidewalk around the school. Ethiopia Trivia Question - How many miles of coastline does Ethiopia have? Trivia Answer - none Ethiopia is land locked (trick question)

Thursday - We'll have an ice cream Sundae sale again at lunch. Trivia Question - Ethiopian New Year, is celebrated on September 11, which is also the feast of John the Baptist. This celebration is a spring festival, with kids dancing in the streets, handing out flowers and miniature paintings, bonfires and plenty of singing and dancing. Trivia Answer - Enkutatash

Friday - We'll announce our winners and have them pick up their prizes. We will then kick off our work month and invite people to come and work with us.

Shorewood Intermediate School, Shorewood, Wisconsin

Shorewood Intermediate School had a very successful two-day presentation for the education days. The students presented to the language arts classes on the first day and the social studies classes on the second day! The first day's focus was on the culture of Ethiopia. We saw slides, listened to stories and music, and ate some very authentic food. On the second day we played the population distribution game, learned about the hardships that Ethiopian children face, and found out what we could do to help.

As far as our work effort has gone, we have held two car washes, (one was cancelled due to the weather), we are visiting a retirement home, and we have passed out sponsor sheets. Compared to last year, our fund raising is going slowly. We have talked about it in our meetings and we have a plan for next year. It is about learning, right!

Schroeder Middle School, Grand Forks, North Dakota

Schroeder was very fortunate this year. Four days before our workday we had snow and rain but yesterday the ODW Gods opened up the skies and gave us a fairly clear day with temps in the low 50s!

All the students went to their jobs, behaved and did an admirable job. Approximately $3900 was raised by the 200 7th graders. The comments from the community were positive.

By all accounts ODW 2002 in Grand Forks was an absolute success! Well - 364 days until ODW V!

ODW Wisconsin Heights, Mazomaine, Wisconsin 2002 Activities

Education - The 7th grade students have been studying about Africa in Social Studies. They have had the opportunity to spend some time focusing on Ethiopia's culture.

Work Days - There have been a variety of opportunities for our students to volunteer these past few weeks. Our activities began on Saturday, April 20th, which was Dane County Youth Service Day. 25 students from Heights volunteered for clean up at the Henry Vilas Zoo in Madison. Students have also volunteered at the local nursing home for 3 consecutive Saturday's. One week they brought in their pets to share with the residents. The next week, they bowled with the residents (using plastic balls and pins - of course!). The last week students did arts and crafts activities with the residents. Lastly, we had two car washes, one on May 7th, and one on May 14th.

Lebanon High School, Lebanon, New Hampshire, May 8, 2002

Forty Lebanon High School students participated in the international student work day, Operation Day's Work on May 8. Students worked in teams of two at private homes and businesses in Lebanon, Hanover and Norwich while a team of six conducted a car wash at The Fort. By each working four hours, and through the generous contributions of the employees, these Lebanon High School students raised $1150.

The Thetford Academy, Thetford Hills, Vermont, May 8, 2002

The Thetford Academy workday on May, 8 was a great success. We had beautiful weather and even got some coverage from our local paper. About 90% of our student body worked, and we are estimating that we raised between $7,500 and $8,000! We got great reactions from almost all of our employers and the word about ODW is spreading quickly. This year we got more jobs than we could use and have to give some to Lebanon High School. We have found that sending a letter to the editor of your local paper asking for jobs usually gets TONS of jobs!

Cabot School, Cabot, Vermont

On Friday May 17, Cabot School in Cabot, Vermont, embarked on our first attempt at Operation Day's Work. We worked in the morning from 9 to 12 and 31 students brought in more then $500. We are very excited. For our first year, I think things at Cabot have gone fairly well. Next year, I have a feeling, the students will take even more charge and explore the country chosen even further.

Astoria High School, Astoria, Oregon

Along with the following list, students are also involved in: steelhead survey, cleaning activities around campus, and a faculty car wash has been arranged where students wash the car during school, so the faculty can leave looking rejuvenated.

• April 11 - Volunteer work at Clatsop Community Actions Food Bank. Students did office work, cleaning, stocking, and repack.
• April 15-19 - International Week, classroom talks, talking about Operation Days Work, Ethiopia, And A Glimmer of Hope. Cream pie and duct taping of coaches, and teachers. Daily showings of international films in the library reference room. School Assembly talking about Operation Days Work, Ethiopia, And A Glimmer of Hope
• April 19 - Intentional music show on KMUN 91.9 Free community movie night
• April 20 - Benefit A Thon & Students with sponsors work around the community at Pioneer Cemetery, Bridges Senior Care Center, Clatsop Care, Clatsop Care Village, Haukies’ Sentry Super Market, pipe line road, school maintenance, river front walk way, car wash
• April 26 Free community movie night
• April 27 Car Wash
• May 3 Free community movie night
• May 4 Car Wash
• ay 6 Redecorate room at Clatsop Care Center
• May 9 Volunteer work at Clatsop Community Actions Food Bank. Students did office work, cleaning, stocking, and repack.
• May 10 Free community movie night
• May 17 Free community movie night
• May 18 Car Wash & Bike A Thon at fort Steven’s state Park
• May 24 Free community movie night
• May 25 Car Wash & Annual ODW 3 on 3 basketball tournament

• May 29 Close of on going hog raffle
• May 31 Participating in school Carnival & Free community movie night

Edison High School, Minneapolis, Minnesota
May 15th, 2002.

We had a blast! The officers of the planning committee stayed late while the other 40 or so volunteers went to their assigned worksites. The weather was great. Plenty of sunshine, yet not too hot. We had an O.D.W. poster in which most of us got to sign. We received balloons from Loretta and placed them in the front entrance of the school. By two o' clock, everyone had returned for a group picture, which I still need to develop. We ate pizza and took the rest of the day to get feedback from the volunteers. We also signed each other's t-shirts. It was a blast and everything went smoothly. We are still receiving donations. We are also sending out thank you cards to the businesses who volunteered their services. The planning committee is organizing an ice cream social to celebrate our success. Everything went according to plan and ran very smoothly. This was truly a GREAT experience!

Patrick Henry High School, Minneapolis, Minnesota

This year we had a bigger committee than last year because of many new people to ODW. We were a little unorganized, but we were able to pull the workday off!

Our International Day was on a Saturday morning. We started the morning off with a slide show from ODW (some of you might remember it from the convention). Then we had a solidarity breakfast. After that we broke into small groups to participate in several different sessions. The first session was painting pictures of how students viewed Ethiopia. The second session was an informational session on Ethiopia. We played Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes in Ethiopia's native language. The third session was a lecture from Sandra Clifford, from Educate the Children (our program in Nepal last year.) The fourth session (and I think everyone's favorite) was floor hockey, with one "rich" team and one "poor" team. The "poor" team used sticks instead of hockey sticks (remember from the ODW video ). Next, we had a delicious, authentic Hmong lunch.

Our work day was four days later. We had about 100 students working at businesses and organizations all over Minneapolis. Students worked everywhere from Dairy Queen to painting portraits of teachers on the front steps of the school. Some of the students found their own jobs. Two of our students went to the Humphrey Forum and recorded School News reports with Ann. These reports are played on our local jazz radio station. Great Publicity! We also hung a banner on a building close to our school that read, "Make a Difference, Operation Day's Work" I think we have raised about $2,000 this year. I worked at the Norwegian Consulate in downtown Minneapolis and they offered to publish an article about ODW in their newsletter. I plan to write an article for them and hopefully for our local newspaper as well.

To wrap everything up, our ODW committee will be hosting an ODW BBQ next week for all the students, parents and teachers who helped throughout the year. Congratulations to everyone on another Workday! Thanks so much to Ann and Mr. Damm for all your help!

Tipton ODW Workday, Tipton, Iowa

We had 28 people working this year with 30 jobs. Fifteen people found their own jobs and the other people worked for the city cleaning pools, painting gas meters, cleaning fire stations, perfoming various tasks for the police station, or cleaning parks. Four other students worked for the school cleaning up the baseball field in preparation for their first game. All of the students enjoyed their experiences and expect to make around $1,200. The program is being passed on to two other students in our high school in hopes that Tipton ODW and ODW will continue to grow as a whole.

Newton School, South Stafford, Vermont

We had a splendid Ethiopian Dinner at our cafe in Strafford. A man from Ethiopia come and cooked injera and wat for us. It was wonderful and we made lots of money. Also, a man from A Glimmer of Hope, is coming to give a slideshow on Ethiopia to the 7th and 8th graders in our school. In addition, a 7th grade girl from Ethiopia may be coming to talk to some of our students. Thanks for all your hard work.

Hanover High School, Hanover, New Hampshire

The first Operation Day's Work campaign of Hanover High School (HHS) was, for the most part, a success! The year had a very shaky start trying to find our advisor Laurie Harrington and trying to find committed students, but in the end, with the dedication of old and new members, we were able to make ODW work at our school.

Our campaign started with meetings on educating interested students about the program. In the short time we had, we tried our best to educate ourselves about Ethiopia and Ethiopian culture. The slide show from John Layton, who will be traveling to Dembi Dello in June as part of A Glimmer of Hope, was the highlight of our education campaign.

During the week of May 13, the participants of HHS-ODW worked very hard to run 4 bake sales for the students of HHS. During these four days we reached many of the student body by our mere presence and just being there to talk to them about ODW. It was also a success because of the $520.00 profit that we raised.

May 25 was our workday. We worked very hard in planning a car wash, which took place right in front of the school. We had a bunch of dedicated car washers who worked from 8:30 AM-4:00 PM. Everyone who had their car washed received information about ODW and they were able to see firsthand, the hard work and dedication of the students in their plight to help the youth of Ethiopia. We made over $1,000.00!

We are so glad that we brought ODW to HHS because we have seen it blossom! Seeing the smiles that it brings to people's faces is just amazing and worth all the time and hard work that it takes!

Safety Harbor, Safety Harbor, Florida

Safety Harbor Middle School's Work Day didn't go as well as I thought it would because we didn't have enough time to prepare for it, we had less than a month to plan it. Plus, our TV program was very slow and wouldn't televise the information half of the time. But we plan on starting earlier for next year, so we can be ready. We did raise $60, which is unfortunate, but only 4 people were able to work on the Work Day and we only got 2 jobs. Next year will be better. Thanks for all of the help!