(l to r) Julie Smith-Bartoloni, Principal Jeff Slater and Liza Stearns

The Curley received an award from Boston Cares recently for Outstanding Community Partnership!

Recipients were selected from a pool of inspiring nominations offered by volunteer, community and corporate members of the Boston Cares community. Curley parents Julie Smith-Bartoloni, Liza Stearns and Rebecca Nieto, together with Principal Jeff Slater, accepted the award on behalf of the Curley community at the Boston Cares Annual Awards Reception. Boston Cares has created a video highlighting the Curley’s Community Partnership with them:

Since 2010 Boston Cares has partnered with the Curley School in Jamaica Plain on projects that have both benefited and engaged the school’s 800 students, teachers and parents. Corporate volunteer and September 11th Tribute projects have ranged from playground improvement to painting murals to rebuilding the library database after it crashed. Additionally, the Curley School has hosted our Martin Luther King Day of Service for the past two years, mobilizing 1300 volunteers to produce education packets, dental hygiene kits, baby quilts, greeting cards, recreational supplies and nutritious snacks for over 6,000 Boston public school students, veterans, struggling families and the homeless. Boston Cares notes that one of the best ways to grow volunteers is to get them involved as kids. In years to come, hundreds of adult volunteers will remember that their earliest community service experiences were as children who served on Martin Luther King Day at the Curley School.

Congrats everyone for the well deserved recognition!

Upcoming volunteer opportunities:

• For the third consecutive year, the Curley will again host the MLK Day of Service on Monday, January 21, 2013. This is a family-friendly event – all are welcome to attend for a little time or a lot. More details will be sent out closer to the date.
• On Saturday, January 17, Boston Cares has arranged for volunteers from Target to come into the building to do some painting. Any parents who are interested in helping that day would be welcomed!

For more information on the partnership and other Boston Cares volunteer opportunities at the Curley, contact Julie Smith-Bartoloni.