This Summer Camp Concentrates on Service

Service is one of the core values at Saint Viator High School and that was on full display last week as its unique Service & Song Camp.

More than 40 middle school students participated in the camp, along with students from Saint Viator who served as leaders, and another 10 adults who led individual teams. 

One of those adults was Mr. Pat McGarry, a theology teacher at the school and a group leader. 

“This is such a wholesome activity,” McGarry said. “The kids get a taste of what service is about at Saint Viator, and they get to meet other kids.”

Each afternoon, teens divided up into groups and spread out to serve at social service agencies located across the Northwest suburbs as well as at individual homes.

Stops included making lunches for the homeless at Journeys: The Road Home in Palatine and Catholic Charities in Des Plaines; making fleece blankets and cards for veterans served by Salute, Inc. in Palatine; compiling 94 boxes of food – or more than 20,000 meals – at Feed My Starving Children in Schaumburg; collecting food from the surrounding neighbors for the Wheeling Township Food Pantry and working in the yards of 10 senior citizens. 

Mrs. Ann Perez led the camp as its director. She serves as Assistant to the President for Mission at Saint Viator and has been involved with the camp for many years. 

“The camp gives students the opportunity to form a community and to go out to serve those who are in need,” Perez said. 

One of the unique sites where campers worked was the Viatorian Community Garden, located on the grounds of the Viatorian Province Center in Arlington Heights. Its mission is to grow nutritious vegetables for area food pantries, including the Wheeling Township food pantry, where some campers visited.

The young people met at the garden with Dwayne Anderson, a certified master gardener with the University of Illinois Extension Program, who described some of the vegetables planted in the garden’s 25 raised beds.

Afterwards, the campers worked in pairs to load mulch to spread in the garden’s paths and do some weeding and watering.

Finn McLeod, who will be a senior at Saint Viator this year, led this particular team as they worked with their wheelbarrows and shovels.

“This is my sixth year attending the camp,” Finn said. “I’m enjoying leading it and making it fun for the kids as they give back to the community.”

Therese George, an eighth grader from Palatine, returned to the camp this year. She likened its mission to her Girl Scout troop, which looks for ways to serve the community.

“I like going to the different sites,” Therese said, “and I like gardening.”

For Nicole Rogers of Glenview, who will be a freshman at Saint Viator, this was her first time attending the camp. 

“I knew I would get my service hours completed, but it’s turned out better than I expected,” Nicole said. “I like it, it’s been fun.”

On the group’s final day of camp, they created fleece blankets for injured veterans and their caregivers served by SALUTE, Inc., based in Palatine. 

“This is the eighth year that students have made these blankets at this camp,” said Mary Beth Beiersdorf, executive director of SALUTE. “It’s a gesture of kindness and love to the veterans and their caregivers from Saint Viator.”