If you drove around Westport last weekend, you may have noticed an unusual number of high school boys weeding, planting, mulching, painting, cleaning and picking up garbage.
What a bunch of SLOBs.
That’s the great acronym for Staples’ Service League Of Boys. One of the most popular clubs at the high school, it’s a way for boys — and their parents — to join together in community service.
From Friday to Sunday — during the group’s annual Service Weekend — SLOBs and their parents (with a few grandparents) contributed 425 hours of work to our town. It was a welcome return to in-person service, after 2 years of COVID-curtailed inaction.
Yard work at A Better Chance of Westport’s Glendarcy House …
Projects included:
- Cleanup of the Staples High School campus
- Cleanup of the Leonard Schine Natural Playground
- Participation in the USPS Food Drive (helping at Person to Person in Norwalk and the Westport Women’s Club, which received pantry goods)
- Cleanup at Smith Richardson Preserve
- Planting and mulching at A Better Chance of Westport’s Glendarcy House
- Cleanup and planting at Open Doors Shelter in Norwalk
- Packing 300 snack bags for students at Curiale School in Bridgeport
- Volunteering at the Westport Tree Board, Wakeman Town Farm, Green Village Initiative and Westport Dog Festival
- Volunteering at Experience Camps’ Day of Champions and AWARE fundraisers.
… and working on the USPS food drive in Norwalk …
With 275 members, SLOBs is the largest student club at Staples. It’s run by an executive board of 11 boys, and their mothers.
Throughout the year, the group partners with over 50 local non-profits and organizations. Whatever they need, SLOBs provides.
A few examples: Monthly collections of canned goods for food pantries, supplies for animal shelters, and sports equipment for underfunded programs. Since September they’ve volunteered at over 70 community events, in Westport and neighboring towns. That’s over 3,800 hours of service.
… and packing snack bags for food-insecure children …
Money from an annual fundraiser — a 3-v-3 basketball tournament for students — helps pay for things like snack bags for kids facing food insecurity, and the Service Weekend projects.
But their year isn’t over. SLOBs will be out in the community throughout the spring, helping at the Levitt Pavilion, Remarkable Theater, the Fine Arts Festival and Wakeman Town Farm, and providing lunches for clients at the Gillespie Center.
,,, and cleaning up all over town …
Congratulations and thanks to all who participated — and executive board members Jason Bass and Jaden Mueller and their moms, Pam and Merri. Presidents this year are Ben Berkley and his mother Andrea.
Our SLOBs are pretty neat!
… and taking a break at the Leonard Schine Natural Playground.
SLOBs are not only “pretty neat” but an inspiration and a role model for this generation of young people. Congratulations to the adults who mentor and lead this group of fine Staples students. This top in the nation school not only has high preforming academics but a caring and responsible culture. Kudos!
We truly could not have had a successful Day of Champions this year without the SLOBs and their parents who came in two shifts to help up set up, manage our activities and clean up PJ Romano for a day of sports. We can’t wait to have them back again. -The Day of Champions Committee
Our SLOB volunteers at Day of Champions for Experience Camps were fantastic! Polite, helpful and hardworking. They really helped the day run smoothly. I look forward to my own kids participating when they’re old enough.
I echo Sara’s comments. They were a wonderful group to work with and were so pleasant especially considering many of them had an early start (8am!) to help us. The SLOB organization is such a wonderful reflection of the good ideals we are trying to cultivate in Westport.
HEROES
On behalf of the Westport Woman’s Club – thank you to the SLOBs for helping at the USPS Food Drive at our clubhouse this Saturday.
“It takes a village”…and ours is a “caring is sharing” one…
Extremely proud of my Grand Nephew, Jack Whittle. Jack is a recent transplant to the Westport Community from Wilmett, Il. Jack makes his family proud everyday, A recent Eagle Scout and Football Co Captain at Staples High School. Jack has been raised to value God, Family, Community and the USA.