“They see they can effect change in the world.” — Jennifer Satterfield, Clearview SIA director
Clearview Regional School District is in the spotlight, again. This time it’s because both the high school and middle school won big in the Jefferson Awards Students in Action competition.
The Jefferson Awards Foundation is a national foundation founded in 1972 by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Sen. Robert Taft Jr. and Sam Beard with the purpose of inspiring change in communities across the country through public service. Winners of this award include Condoleezza Rice, Sandra Day O’Connor and Thurgood Marshall.
In 2006, the Jefferson Awards Foundation implemented Students in Action (SIA), a program meant to shape students into future community, nation and world leaders.
Since 2016, Clearview Regional High School has won multiple awards through this program, including first place this year in the state at the ambassador level, the highest level before the national competition.
This year marks the middle school’s first time competing, placing second in the state at the ambassador level.
At the high school level, Jennifer Satterfield serves as the SIA director and Jessica Datz as the co-director. The middle school director is John Wiseburn.
The driving force behind this recognition is a comprehensive report of every service project conducted throughout the year in the school district.
“We have to report the number of hours students spent for service projects, every pint of blood, every pound of cans collected, toys donated for the holidays. … We do more than any other school in the state,” Satterfield said.
The application is submitted by SIA directors, but Satterfield said the directors merely facilitate while the students are the ones who carry out the efforts of the projects and create a written narrative for each one. The narratives must fall in line with the three pillars the Jefferson Award Foundation set out for SIA — leadership, engagement, impact.
Satterfield and the co-directors feel Clearview students have learned, practiced and grown in these three categories, especially during service projects and partnerships, including Hoagies 4 Hope, the Latin Club-sponsored blood drive, UrbanPromise-Camden and AWAKEN Kibera: a nonprofit organization focusing on aiding young women living in Kibera, Kenya.
“This is a Clearview award,” Satterfield said, stressing that while SIA oversees and records all of these projects and more throughout the year, it’s the different clubs and groups within the district that carry out the public service.
“Without the teachers and members of these clubs, we would never win,” she said.
While the award and recognition are appreciated, Satterfield said the real goal of the ongoing service projects in Clearview is the commitment to service these students are developing at such a young age.
“SIA is training them to be leaders and to take initiative,” she said.
Through Clearview’s success in the SIA program, students have sat face-to-face with individuals such as Sen. Cory Booker and other political figures along with celebrities and corporate executives.
“They make connections,” Satterfield said.
Of the new middle school team, Wiseburn said, “the students really believed in the purpose of community and were extremely dedicated to all the integrate facets of the program. I am beyond words on how impressed I was with their performance and oral presentation the other day. They represented Clearview in a fabulous way.”
The foundation formed a Think Big team in recent years, an advisory board of students who are active in strategizing and implementing events. Clearview Regional students Sonja Hegel and Andrew String are part of this group along with 20 other students from across the country.
Hegel said, “Before I was a part of Students In Action, I was unsure of myself and my passions, and as soon as I went to my first conference I realized that public service is my passion. Thanks to SIA I am confident in my abilities as a leader and have the initiative to activate my own service projects.”
Rebekah Strauss, a Clearview junior who just recently took first prize in the Princeton Price for Race Relations is also part of SIA.
“I am incredibly passionate about service learning, so to be recognized for an award about service learning is so surreal. I am so thankful for the Jefferson Awards Foundation for allowing us to compete and display what our school can contribute to our community,” she said.
