Volunteer of the Month

Taking Service Seriously: Abraham Joshua Heschel School

For this month’s featured volunteer, we decided to go a different route: while in the past we’ve recognized certain individuals with an outstanding commitment to service, this month we chose to honor one of our partner organizations, Abraham Joshua Heschel School, who has gone above and beyond to help New Yorkers living in poverty.

This month alone Heschel School mobilized 240 high school students to participate in 11 projects across 4 different locations to help with relief efforts for Hurricane Sandy.  Heschel’s students and staff recognized that – five months later – there was still work to be done to aid long-term recovery for communities affected by last year’s superstorm.  In response, Heschel volunteers cleaned up storm debris, prepared a new warehouse for item storage, assisted low-income senior housing residents, and conducted critical needs assessments.  All of these projects served to help residents and communities get their lives back on track. 

This wasn’t the first time Heschel has engaged in community service at Met Council.  In the past, Heschel volunteers have served hot meals, made hundreds of lunches, assembled food packages, and distributed benefits access materials to low income neighborhoods.   Abraham Joshua Heschel School’s remarkable commitment to service and tireless work for Hurricane Sandy recovery efforts has made them formidable partners in fighting poverty.  And for this reason, Heschel is featured as our volunteers of the month.