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	Run for Change!
	Penny Harvest Field

Enroll today for the 2013-2014 Penny Harvest! We're excited for another memorable year of philanthropy and service! Check out some video reflections on our blog from the Penny Harvest at PS 163! Stay connected:

Who do you think should be responsible for teaching our children to be good citizens? Families Schools Religious institutions Educational programs (like the Penny Harvest!) All of the above

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This year we invited community members to visit philanthropy Roundtables at our schools to observe students making grant decisions. This is a reflection from one of those visits.

On a recent Friday afternoon I was invited to sit around the table with an impressive group of handpicked leaders. In that meeting:

• They presented an analysis of research they had done.
• They discussed interviews they had conducted with senior management at various non-profits.
• They admitted to the challenges and struggles of their work and they reflected on their feelings as mentors to future leaders.

You may think that I am describing a meeting with corporate executives, but in fact I am describing a meeting of 4th grade students in the Common Cents "Knights of Service" Roundtable at PS 7 in Brooklyn.

These 16 students, chosen by their teachers, and led by Roundtable Coach Susan Pavane, also a teacher in the school, had shortened one lunch period per week for four months in order to participate in the Common Cents Roundtable. Their job was to decide how to allocate $1,500 between organizations that support causes that the students found important.

Over four months they narrowed down the list of causes they would support, from feeding the homeless to taking care of abandoned animals to helping autistic children. They researched relevant organizations and conducted phone interviews with senior personnel in those organizations to ask them what they would do with the money if awarded a grant. The Roundtable also began several service campaigns within the school including a recycling campaign and an awareness effort encouraging students not to waste food. Lastly, as "Teachers of Tomorrow," they went to kindergarten classes to help younger children develop their reading and writing skills.

At the end of the Roundtable process, they had divided the money between seven organizations, and made plans to visit two of these grant recipients. The immense pride they felt in telling about their Roundtable journey would have filled a hot air balloon.

As I held back tears of pride, I said to myself, this is one of the many wonderful things about Common Cents. These lessons could not have been learned from a textbook. And yet, perhaps more than facts and figures, I have no doubt that these lessons will remain forever in the hearts and minds of these students. I look forward to sitting around the table with these students in a corporate boardroom one day as I know they will be well prepared.

Donna Spector is a long-time Common Cents volunteer and is the parent of a Penny Harvest student.

           -March, 2010

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