Students and parents, please mark your calendars for the following upcoming events that will support the service work that GFA students will be doing at the Linda Vista School in Costa Rica this summer.

Included here are a series of images of the Linda Vista School and a few of the Costa Rican children who will benefit from the funds raised at the following two events.

Five-on-Five Soccer Tournament.

Sunday, May 15. 12pm-3pm @ GFA

$25 per team, register via email with Andrés Mondino.  Soccer players and non-athletes are welcome.  GFA students, parents and all others are encouraged to participate.

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Costa Rica Benefit

Sunday, May 22

6:30pm-9:30pm

@ G/R/A/N/D, 15 Bank St. Stamford

RSVP via Paperless Post by Sunday 5/15.

Donations accepted at the door.

Students should contact Meighan Grady, Allie Anderson or Kate Mohr with questions.

There will be dancing, snacks, a photo booth and a raffle for Red Sox vs. Yankees tickets.  Because GLOBE (the student organization sponsoring the event) must pay for refreshments per person, it is important the you RSVP if you would like to attend this dance.  In addition, it is equally important that you not RSVP if you don’t actually plan to attend.  GLOBE obviously doesn’t want to pay for refreshments for people who aren’t there to eat them.

NOTE TO PARENTS ON THIS EVENT: While it is out of the ordinary for students to run events like this on a Sunday night, the management at G/R/A/N/D was generous enough to donate their space for a charity event on a Sunday evening (not on the weekend).  Also, parents should know that there will be security and parent chaperones (appropriate for the number of students who RSVP), and that G/R/A/N/D, like GFA, has a zer0-tolerance policy for underage drinking and drug use of any kind.

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As many of you will know a group of GFA students traveled to Linda Vista, Costa Rica last June on a service learning trip.  During their stay, students volunteered at the local school planting trees, sanding some old doors and painting a recently constructed bathroom.

The students who are participating in this year’s trip, with the support of the Community Service Board and GLOBE (a student club devoted to promoting education around the world) are hoping to raise enough funds to have an even greater impact on the Linda Vista School when the travel to Costa Rica this June.

Some possible plans for this year’s service project include planting hundreds of coconut trees around the students’ soccer field and working to rebuild the school’s assembly space pictured above.  As of now, there is nowhere in Linda Vista where more than about twenty people (students or adults) can reasonably assemble under one roof.  With the support of the GFA community at the fundraising events listed above, our students hope to work to begin addressing this area of need.