Brighten Your Day

High School Graduates Use Senior Trip Money To Help Their Community

July 9, 2021

Students from a high school in Maine have donated the $8,000 raised for their senior trip to help people in need.

Islesboro Central School / Credit: Melissa Burns via AP

This year, members of Islesboro Central School's Class of 2021 — all 13 of them — were eyeing a trip to Greece, or maybe South Korea. Previous trips have gone to the France, Iceland, Norway and Italy.

This year they're going nowhere.

Instead, they donated $5,000 to help out their neighbors struggling in the wake of the pandemic.

"It felt sort of obvious that it needed to go back to the island community," said Olivia Britton, 17, one of this year's graduates.

The seniors raised nearly $8,000 by working concession stands, holding harvest and winter festivals, and hosting community suppers.

$5,000 went to the Island Community Fund to help people who were out of work and needed money for food or rent. The students and are still deciding where to donate the remaining money.

It would have seemed "weird and definitely wrong" to be spending money on an overseas trip during a time of such difficulties, said student Liefe Temple.

"We could really see how the whole world and the island, too, was struggling. So it felt really good to do that with our money, to give it back to the people who gave it to us," Temple said.