We are a group of 8th grade students from French International School of Oregon and as an IB school we are required to do a group community service project for our last year at the school. We are very excited to be a part of this project and hopefully be able to make a difference in our community. The central idea for our project is “personal and cultural expression” and after doing some research on what problems exist around this topic, we have found that more and more children are starting to have more of a limited access to an environment where they can use their imaginations and be creative. Through our research we have found that access to art supplies has also become limited as some schools in our area have also started to take less priority into helping their art programs to make more room to improve other subjects. For our final project, we have decided to try to involve our community in our project by doing an art supplies drive. We are asking for art supplies, preferably new but used, is also great if they are still in a good condition and that a child would be excited to receive. With the supplies that we receive, we will be creating small boxes with supplies and including ideas of crafts that could be done with them. These boxes will be decorated by one of the 2nd grade classes at our school and then taken to two different organizations that will distribute them to children in our community. We will be taking these boxes to St. Matthew’s Lutheran church food pantry as well as NW children’s outreach; two organizations in our community that help children and families receive access to food, clothes and toys.  A box for donations was available at the Village Gallery of Arts in Beaverton from January 13th until February 3rd. We are grateful for the support we received and thank everyone in our community who has helped us make this project a success. 

Josie B, Penelope B, and Max C

8th graders from French International middle school