LHS students educate SC about environmental, civic projects

SOPHOMORES, from left, Grace Pena, Lila Martins and Nandana Nishanth presented their Civics Action Project about cultural assimilation during the School Committee’s April 23 meeting.

 

By DAN TOMASELLO

LYNNFIELD — Seven Lynnfield High School students who undertook projects seeking to make a positive impact in Lynnfield and beyond gave an overview of the issues they studied during the School Committee’s April 23 meeting.

Junior Marissa Calamari used recyclable materials to make homemade dog toys for her Environmental Science and Sustainability project. She and other students in the class presented their projects during the recent Sustainability Fair that was held in the LHS gym.

“Our project had to make a positive environmental impact,” said Marissa. “I made homemade dog toys out of recyclable materials such as old T-shirts, socks, fleece blankets, water bottles, plastic water bottles and tennis balls. The average person in America throws out 85 pounds of clothes every year, with most of it ending up in landfills. Everyone has heard about how much plastic is in our oceans. Not only is it dangerous to marine animals, plastic endangers humans who consume the fish. My goal was to help reduce and reuse materials that would have been disposed of and had a harmful impact on our land and oceans.”

Marissa made 75 dog toys for her project.

“I made braided ropes, crinkle toys and throw toys,” said Marissa. “I donated them to the Northeast Animal Shelter. I enjoyed this project very much, and I would recommend the Environmental Science class to other students who want to make a difference and improve our planet.”

School Committee Chair Kate DePrizio said Marissa did a “wonderful job” creating the homemade dog toys.

“I think it is wonderful that you gave the toys to dogs who need homes,” said DePrizio. “I think that is a beautiful ending to all of the hard work you did on this project.”

School Committee member Jamie Hayman said he was “really impressed” with the projects students created at the Sustainability Fair.

“I think you did a great job with this project,” said Hayman. “Thank you for coming and presenting tonight.”

Senior Lilly Collins undertook an Environmental Science and Sustainability project that entailed using every day materials to create organic skin care products.

“I am going to esthetician school next year, so I wanted to do a project that would be related to that,” said Lilly. “I developed safe skin, which is all homemade ingredients. Everything is organic, and there are no chemicals. I do not want to put any chemicals on anybody’s skin next year when I am learning what to put on people’s skin.”

As part of Lilly’s project, she created QR codes that allow people to access an app called the Leaping Bunny Cruelty Free Shopping Guide to find out which products use animal testing or not.

“The United States has the highest rate of animal testing out of any country in the world,” said Lilly. “This app will allow you to scan any product that you can buy in stores that will tell you if it used animal testing or not. I thought that was a good way to hopefully keep animals alive. That is very important to me, and it should be important to you guys as well.”

Lilly also created different remedies for “every single type of skin.”

“There are five main types of skin: Combination, dry, oily, normal and sensitive,” said Lilly. “I wanted all of those to have their own specific remedy.”

In response to a question from DePrizio, Lilly said she used materials located in her home’s cabinets for her project.

“I used green tea bags, crushed up vitamin C pills, coconut oil, baking soda, honey and things such as those,” said Lilly. “Those all have really good benefits. I mixed those things with water and olive oil. Grandmothers swear by olive oil on their skin. They love it, and their skin approves it.”

DePrizio commended Lilly for undertaking a project she is “passionate about and is exploring in the future.”

“It was a natural fit for you,” said DePrizio.

Civics projects

Five sophomores also gave presentations about their Civics Action Projects. The Civics Action Projects were recently presented to the community in the LHS gym.

Marianna Axiotakis and Rocco Scenna undertook a project on the mental health challenges many student-athletes face. Marianna plays for the volleyball and softball teams while Rocco suits up for the boys’ soccer team. Zahir Mitchell, who was unable to attend the School Committee’s meeting, plays football, basketball and runs with the spring track team.

“We did our project on student-athlete mental health,” said Marianna. “We picked this topic because we could relate to it and it was an issue that wasn’t getting talked about enough.”

Rocco said the group administered a survey to LHS students, and said the results revealed that a lot of student-athletes do not know how to cope with mental health challenges.

“After we gathered the information, we started doing research,” said Rocco.

Marianna said Substance Use Prevention Coordinator Peg Sallade and Athletic Director Mia Muzio were very helpful to the three sophomores while they undertook the project. She also said the students’ spoke with Jake Cavanaugh, Erica Tangney and Donna Kausek from The Nan Project, which raises awareness about depression and suicide.

“That was a huge help for our project,” said Marianna.

Rocco said the group will be attending a workshop that seeks to identify ways to help student-athletes improve their mental health.

“We are also going to work with Ms. Muzio to talk to all of the sports teams’ captains,” said Rocco. “We want to bring in The Nan Project, and inform the captains about mental health. We want to help each other so we can make a difference.”

Marianna agreed.

“The captains will be able to provide help,” said Marianna.

DePrizio said having captains become more aware of their teammates’ mental health challenges is a good way to make sure students get the help that they need.

“Hopefully that is successful in the future,” said DePrizio. “You guys did a wonderful job with this project.”

School Committee Vice Chair Kristen Grieco Elworthy asked what are the main issues facing student-athletes.

Rocco said time management is a “huge” issue.

“It all starts with time management,” said Rocco. “You become overwhelmed and feel anxious about stuff. I know football practices go on for a wicked long time. You get home at 6 p.m., and you need to eat, shower and can have loads of homework if you are not managing your time well. We are trying to find ways to help student-athletes manage their time better, and how to deal with anxiety and feeling overwhelmed.”

Marianna concurred with Rocco’s viewpoint.

“The stress of managing student life and being an athlete can cause a lot of anxiety,” said Marianna.

Marianna also said that the group created an Instagram page that includes mental health quotes that seeks to help student-athletes.

Rocco, Marianna and Zahir’s project impressed Elworthy.

“That’s great great insights and really good analysis,” said Elworthy. “Good work guys.”

Hayman noted that a number of Civics Action Projects focused on mental health.

“It’s really hard to talk about mental health, and I applaud you guys for talking about it,” said Hayman. “The more we talk about it, the more we can do about it. The purpose of the Civics Action Projects is to find problems that we can attempt to fix.”

Lila Martins, Nandana Nishanth and Grace Pena undertook a project about cultural assimilation.

“All of us are first generation Americans,” said Lila. “We believe that students should not feel forced to assimilate into American culture. They should feel free to experience both American culture and their native culture. We want to see more culture represented throughout Lynnfield. Cultural assimilation can have many negative affects such as discrimination, loss of identity and confidence, loss of history through generations and mental health struggles.”

 

Nandana said, “The definition of cultural assimilation is it is the process of which individuals adopt the beliefs, values and social customs of their present community.”

“One of the primary negative affects of cultural assimilation is many people feel disconnected with their culture of their origin,” said Nandana. “We hope to encourage inclusion and representation of our community’s different cultures by raising awareness about the cultural disconnect that we have felt ourselves, and connect to others struggling with their own cultural identity through our own experiences.”

Grace said the group will be hanging flags of different countries “that students in our community come from” in the LHS cafeteria.

“We want to raise awareness about the cultures that we have in Lynnfield,” said Grace. “We have obtained flags from different countries across the globe”

Nandana said the flags initiative is a “really cool way to visually represent all of the cultures in Lynnfield.”

DePrizio expressed her support for the flags initiative, and asked the students to let the School Committee know when they will be put on display in the LHS cafe.

“It’s a really nice way to welcome people into that space,” said DePrizio.

Grace also said the group organized a cultural music night event in order to “celebrate the different cultures in Lynnfield.”

“Sharing music from cultures gives insight about people’s way of life,” said Grace. “We hope that through the music that we hear, both performers and the audience will feel connected to their roots while also learning about the many beautiful cultures here in Lynnfield.”

DePrizio asked the three sophomores if they will be holding more cultural music nights in the future.

The students said yes.

Hayman thanked LHS Science Department Head Scott Gordon for overseeing the Sustainability Projects and LHS history teacher Jen Goguen for helping organize the Civics Action Projects.

“We talk about what makes the high school different,” said Hayman. “The students are doing a ton of work, and it takes a lot of work to inspire students to want to do this. I don’t think that should go unnoticed.”

School Committeeman Jim Dillon was impressed with the students’ projects.

“I am very impressed with the students here,” said Dillon. “I think you are representative of the students I saw at both fairs in terms of passion and articulation. I think that speaks well for all of the students and the faculty at Lynnfield High School.”

The meeting’s attendees gave all seven students a round of applause.