Festivities started earlier than usual during this year’s Thanksgiving Happening with the introduction of the Upper School Morning of Service. In the past, Thanksgiving Happening would take place in the second half of the school day, and the first half would be filled with regular classes. Starting this year, Service Committee led an Upper School-wide event where students chose a service activity for the first two hours of the day.
For Morning of Service, Service Committee offered students a wide variety of options with 14 different service group activities:
- Cathedral Kitchen Sandwich and Centerpiece Making
- Blankets and Simple Items Making
- Costume Department Cleanup
- Sports Shed Cleanup
- Sports Service
- Decorating Cookies and No-Bake Dog Treats
- Repurposing T-Shirts into Reusable Shopping Bags
- Sorting Thanksgiving Food Donations
- Cemetery/Meeting House Cleanup
- Stewardship and Cleanup of the Art Room
- Hartman Hall Garden Cleanup
- Community House Cleanup
- First Baptist Church Cleanup
- Mental Health Service
Dean Simpson ’26, a participant in the Decorating Cookies and No-Bake Dog Treats activity, said that he found the Morning of Service to be “a refreshing break from classes and a great way to do some service.”
Simpson and other participants in the activity decorated items that were donated to the First Baptist Church on Main Street.
“I thought it was really fun since I got to relax and decorate cookies with my friends. It also felt really good to do something that had a positive impact on the larger community,” Simpson said.
Rayyan Ansari ’28, a participant in the Hartman Hall Garden Cleanup activity, also shared positive thoughts on the event.
“I thought overall the Morning of Service was a great experience. I’m glad that the school provided an accessible lane where students could get some hours done, but it was also nice to help clean up my own community.”
While this was the first year MFS hosted the Morning of Service, the event had been in the works for years. According to current Service Committee Clerk Sophia Lo Re ’26, the idea originated with former Service Committee Clerks Avani Verma ’24 and Ava Blumberg ’24.
Morning of Service was supposed to start in 2024, but it was cancelled due to rain.
Lo Re said, “Last year, many of the activities were outside or off campus, so it was hard to change the plan, and we had to cancel it. This year, however, many of the activities were either inside or still relatively close to the school, so there would be less of an impact if there was bad weather.”
Lo Re also highlighted the significant amount of work Service Committee put in to make this event come to life.
“We tried to create as many different activities as possible so everyone could find something they actually enjoyed doing. Ben [Buchdahl ’26] and the rest of the clerks and I spent multiple hours sorting everyone into various groups to make sure everyone got placed in an activity that they were interested in.”
Dr. Zemaitis, the Service Committee advisor, shared how excited he was to see the school’s positive reaction to the new event.
“It was just great to hear from folks, ‘Wow, service can be fun.’ I’m glad we provided a space where people didn’t just feel like service was something they had to do, but something they wanted to do.”
