National Honor Society (NHS) chapters consistently find creative ways to serve their schools and communities. In this post, we hear from Elisa Grossman, NHS adviser at Fort Myers High School in Fort Myers, FL, and Khadiza Alam, NHS president. To celebrate February 22, 2022 (Twosday), this chapter made and sold tutus to raise money for an important cause.
Elisa Grossman:
I’ve been teaching special education at Fort Myers High School for seven years, and I’ve been the NHS adviser that entire time. I was excited to take on the adviser role because before coming here, I taught in the gifted program at the local elementary school, so this has given me the opportunity to work with those same kids I worked with there.
On February 2nd, I realized that it was 02-02-2022, and I had the idea for an event making tutus! At first, I thought I was too late, but then realized I’d have another opportunity on 02-22-2022. I reached out to Khadiza to ask if she and the students would be interested in planning a Tutus for Tuesday event. The idea started to snowball from there. Khadiza thought it best to make the tutus at a chapter meeting, which was great because with the previous school closures and shifts to virtual school, many of the students were having a difficult time figuring out how to fit in all of their service hours. Then we decided to sell the tutus to raise money to support a fund we have for students who are unable to pay the registration fee for the ACT and SAT, which is between $25 and $88.
For five days, we made the tutus together after school, and it was a ton of fun. We needed to experience some enthusiasm and excitement because both have been in short supply due to COVID-19. I told the students they could bring music and a friend or two to hang out and sew together. We just laughed and giggled and had a good time. And the tutus were pretty easy to make, though I did realize that the tulle doesn’t go very far.
Khadiza Alam:
I’m a senior this year. I ran for NHS president because I thought I could make an impact. In middle school, I had served as the NJHS president, and I thought it would be fun to continue in a leadership role. And it has been! I’ve met many new people, given that our chapter has nearly 90 members. Everyone has really bonded. We’ve held canned food drives, decorated for holidays, and helped with an art fest. We’ve also really strived to help our teachers out, raising money for items they need and supporting them while they grade papers. In addition to being the NHS president, I’m also the senior class president so it’s been easy to lead the collaboration between our student government and NHS for events like school spirit week and homecoming.
Tutus for Tuesday was a really fun event. We made them in the afternoons and then we sold them during lunch. We wore them on our heads and went around the cafeteria getting people to buy them. We not only raised $61 to support students who needed it to take the ACT and SAT, but we raised school spirit, too. We made the tutus in green, our school color, so now people can wear them for St. Patrick’s Day. It raised the energy level in the school, and everyone needs that right now.
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Our teachers were additionally excited to share these tutus with their grandchildren or put them around lampshades to support our cause!