Berkeley Recognizes the First 50th Anniversary Service Scholars

Berkeley Preparatory School is proud to recognize Abby Scott ’14 and Daniel Stein ’15 as the inaugural winners of the 50th Anniversary Service Scholar Award. Both students were recently recognized for their award-winning service projects in front of their classmates. Scott and Stein were two of 12 students who applied for the merit-based award that requires applicants to develop and implement a service project, which may be local, national or international in scope.

In order to qualify for the award, students demonstrated the essential values of Berkeley in extraordinary ways through academic excellence, discipline, diligence, integrity and possess a keen awareness of and concern for the people and the world around them.

Each candidate was required to demonstrate a strong commitment to serving his or her community such that the student’s activities make a positive difference. The applicants were asked to identify a current local or international service challenge and research and analyze a meaningful and realistic solution to that challenge.

Scott and Stein explained to their upper division classmates how the award will help make their vision to make a positive difference in the world a reality.

Scott’s winning entry, The Players Troop, is a performing arts initiative created to share the performing talents of young people with hospital patients and assisted living facility residents. She considers her efforts a kind of theater for therapy. Her idea evolved from an opportunity during Christmas break when she and other performers sang Christmas carols at a retirement community. At this event she saw the positive impact that such an event can have on the elderly. This motivated her to apply for this award to set up an organization showcasing the talents of Berkeley students throughout the community. She will assemble a small group of talented Berkeley performers to entertain the young and old alike. They will perform music and other short choreographed performances for each audience. Scott hopes that she will not only be able to start this group, but to help it to become a sustainable project at Berkeley long after she graduates.

Stein’s award-winning entry, known as the Hyde Park Charity Awareness Fair and Expo (CAFÉ), brought together charitable organizations from the Tampa Bay area and invite students from the greater community to attend. This event raised awareness for these students as to the various charitable service activities that are available for them to pursue, and hopefully will foster a passion toward community service.

Stein says he witnessed many of his peers performing community service in order to meet their basic service hour requirements and felt that many did not have a passion for giving back to the community. He has shown great commitment to community service through his work delivering baseball equipment to underprivileged children in the Dominican Republic and wanted other students to find their passion for community service. Toward that end he decided to create the CAFÉ event that was held on April 28, 2013 in Old Hyde Park Village. He organized 36 non-profits who set up booths and provided information to students and their parents. He has also partnered with restaurants to donate food and arranged for entertainment. He hopes that this will be the first of many charity awareness fairs. More information can be found on the website he developed for the event at www.cafetampa.org.