On Sunday afternoon, ceramics teacher Jody Cooper and nine OVS students loaded into a van and drove to the Empty Bowls dinner, a fundraiser designed to battle hunger nationwide.The Empty Bowls Foundation is a charity set up in 1990 to raise money and awareness in support of food banks, soup kitchens and other organizations fighting hunger. The Santa Barbara event was launched in 1998.In what has become an OVS tradition, ceramics students donated bowls for the event and afterward helped stack chairs and tables, took out the trash, gathered signs, packed up leftover pots, and, of course, ate soup.“[The students] all worked really hard and got the job done quickly,” said Mrs. Cooper.
Students participating in this year’s event were Jenna McIntosh (pictured at left), Claire Wickenhaeuser, Min Ju Chai, Polina Dermenzhi, Paul Jarusombuti, Bella Jenkins, Daniel Sendyk, Sophie Lin and Natalia Huang.
Mrs. Cooper, who has been attending the event since 2006, said it was great once again to see OVS students pitching in when asked to do so.
“[We are] trying to teach the students how to be philanthropic so that they are doing community service without getting anything in return, except for feeling good about helping someone,” Mrs. Cooper said.
By Daphne Psaledakis
Class of 2015