This year’s Hephzibah Heartprint Award winners. In order from left to right: Jessica Bajerek, Claire Love, Kaily Fox, and Thomas Johnson.
Volunteering to help others is a way of life for the four winners of this year’s Hephzibah’s Heartprint Award. Since 2001, the award has recognized high school seniors from OPRF, Trinity, Fenwick, Riverside Brookfield, and St. Ignatius that have distinguished themselves with their volunteer efforts at Hephzibah. Criteria for the award include attitude, reliability, length of service, and willingness to learn and adapt to difficult situations.
Some of the teen volunteers have been volunteering with Hephzibah for four years while this is the first year for others. The students devote regular hours to Hephzibah’s kids – planning activities, listening to stories, playing games, and just hanging out.
In past years, Hephzibah has traditionally given two HeartPrint Awards; this year’s group of seniors was so exceptional that four were selected, including:
Kaily Fox. Kaily’s family has been involved with Hephzibah for many years so it was natural for Kaily to find herself volunteering with us. She has been a big sister for over a year and is always consistent, upbeat, and energetic as she spends time with her little sister. Whether playing dolls or decorating pumpkins, Kaily’s kindness and enthusiasm has had an enormous impact on the healing and development of her little sister.
Claire Love. Claire has been a member of the Huskie Helper OPRF club for four years and was an officer this year. Since her freshman year, Claire has been a leader, brainstorming ways to increase involvement and recruit more OPRF students. Over the past three years, she has been instrumental in organizing the Huskies – when it seemed that we might not have enough volunteers for the end-of-year rodeo, Claire walked in on the day of the event with 8-10 wrestlers and football players to help! Her involvement saved the day and provided a lot of laughs for everyone as the athletes enjoyed the bounce house.
Thomas Johnson. Thomas has been a volunteer in Hephzibah’s after-school day care program at Beye School since his freshman year. His supervisor, Felicia, says this of Thomas: “Pure and kind hearts are rare to find and Hephzibah has certainly found one in Thomas. The fact that he’s been volunteering since his freshman year speaks volumes. He has been a kind and positive influence to the kids and they love him and look forward to seeing him every Thursday.”
Jessica Bajerek. The fourth and final Heartprint Award recipient, Jessica has been a big sister for the past year to one of the children in our Residence program. She assisted in the 2nd grade classroom this past summer with our full-day daycare program and she also runs the Riverside Brookfield Helping Paws service club of which she is a leader. Jessica’s energy and smiling face has been instrumental in recruiting new volunteers and she has a special knack for thinking up new, fun activities to keep the high school students and their little siblings interacting and engaged.
For information about becoming a volunteer, contact Hannah Weigel at 708-649-7122 or hweigel@hephzibahhome.org.
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