Somerset school honours community connections

BY SARA KEDDY

Kings County Register

Some of perhaps the longest-standing volunteers and community friends of Somerset school were recognized at a celebration assembly June 20: those who have served on over 20 years’ worth of building committees.

Principal Heather Morse was pleased to welcome them to the results of that work: the school’s new gym and stage.

She also welcomed some of Somerset’s newest friends: Berwick firefighters, manning the doors and providing security, as the addition’s alarms and wiring were not yet connected. Fire crews answered a January alarm at the school, putting out a small fire and offering emergency services to students on likely the coldest day this winter. “This is a very important day at Somerset - the day we celebrate our community,” Morse told guests from local businesses, service clubs, organizations and individuals who have all contributed in the past year. “We have spent a long time working on a safe and caring environment, but we can’t do it all, and we have to constantly work on it. Our community supports us.”

Morse took the opportunity to thank the people behind the Feed My Lambs ornament campaign, a project of the Berwick Interfaith Outreach Society that has raised close to $150,000 in the past 10 years. “The outstanding need was the number of children coming to school hungry,” said volunteer - and the artist behind 10 years-worth of ornaments - Twila Robar DeCoste. The money raised has funded breakfast and lunch programs, camps and family support initiatives in local schools - and spread across the province and into Ontario and Alberta. “Almost more rewarding than the success of the ornaments wa the value of the friendships we made, and helping children in need - absolutely priceless.”

The Feed My Lambs project will end in the Berwick area this winter, when Robar-DeCoste releases a final print. Volunteers to keep the initiative going are hard to find. “Food and the cost of living continues to increase, and we hope someone will come along and continue to help our most vulnerable citizens,” Robar-DeCoste said.

Morse presented plaques to Robar-DeCoste, and representatives of all the churches involved in the Feed My Lambs program. “I can’t say how much we appreciate your support.”