Soaring Heights Charter School: Bringing Holiday Joy

Soaring Heights Charter School representative hugging Mrs. Howell
Mrs. Howell (left) and Jacqueline Quagliana (right) Photo by Shirley Davila

While for some families, the holidays are a time of joyous family reunions with an abundance of food, others in Jersey City are facing another day of food insecurity. Last week, the faculty and students of Soaring Heights Charter School finished one of their favorite community service projects, the Thanksgiving food drive. The faculty and students had worked for weeks to collect food to then donate to the True Gospel Holiness, which is a church located in Jersey City. The food that is donated by the annual SHCS Food Drive will be benefiting the local community by collecting items that will last for families – peanut butter, cereal, canned vegetables.

Pick-up Day!

Soaring Heights Charter School Students holding turkeys
Soaring Heights Students. Photo by Shirley Davila.

Students of SHCS excitedly ran back and forth from their school gym picking up turkeys and grocery bags to take over to the pick up truck parked outside. The congregation members of the True Gospel Holiness Church were readily awaiting with smiles on their faces. This has been a yearly tradition for the past 22 years to help those in Jersey City who are facing another day of food insecurity during the holidays. In less than two weeks, the students and faculty brought over a hundred cans of food and more than thirty turkeys. “It is a great community service exercise for our students,” said teacher administrator Jacqueline Quagliana, as students helped to fill up the truck.

Soaring Heights Charter School Students loading truck
Mrs. Howell (left) with Soaring Heights Students. Photo by Shirley Davila

Growing Community Roots

Soaring Heights Charter School is a public charter school located in the Greenville area of Jersey City, NJ. SHCS is helping children develop not only intellectual skills, but also character-building traits such as generosity and compassion. They are teaching the importance of giving back early on through multiple projects of community service such as park clean ups, food drives, and breakfasts for those in need. The next project is the Holiday Breakfast which hosts a food feast for about 300 people. If you would like to learn more about their community service projects please email soaringheights07302@yahoo.com and follow their instagram @shcs_jc .

Shirley Davila
Author: Shirley Davila

Shirley Davila is a freelance writer living in New Jersey originally from Lima, Peru. She is a travel junkie and food aficionado whose always looking for new things to try!