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Schools

BHUSD Students Make Lunches for Charity

Several hundred district students and their families volunteered to make bag lunches on Christmas Eve.

Beverly Hills Unified School District students and their families spent a few hours on Christmas Eve making 1,300 lunches for the hungry. An annual BHUSD Christmas tradition, the event benefited the Greater West Hollywood Food Coalition.

“We had about 300 students show up from all five schools,” said Laura Margo, the head of community service for the Beverly Vista PTA. The event was held at .

Students assembled lunches that contained a sandwich, an apple, chips or a granola bar, a drink, a candy cane, two pieces of candy, a napkin and a handmade card.

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“I like helping the homeless, just like my mom does,” said Evan Baron, a first grade student at Beverly Vista, who was making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches alongside his mother, Glenna.

The community came together to provide the needed items, Margo said. Each of the five schools donated peanut butter, jelly, snacks or drinks. Resident Janis Gurnick contributed 1,400 candy canes.

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Local businesses also helped. Mammoth Water provided a few hundred bottles of water, and Bruce and Stefani Langer, whose children attend Beverly Vista, gave a few hundred Langers juice boxes.

The donated coffee and hot chocolate to all the parents and student volunteers.

“We’d like to give a special thanks to the PTA Council for donating 1,400 apples and for contributing $500 towards the event,” Margo said, referring to the umbrella group for the five BHUSD PTAs.

Even before the event, Beverly Hills elementary students contributed by making 1,300 holiday cards to go into the lunch bags. Each school’s community service representative organized the card collection.

Middle and high school students received four service points for attending the event as part of their . However, that was not the primary reason for being there, most students said.

“It really feels good to help others,” one high school freshman said.

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