Mack Lyon Angel Tree Giving Program Thrives

By VERNON ROBISON

The Progress

Students at Mack Lyon Middle School shared their spirit of giving with dozens of local families in need during this holiday season. The school’s annual Angel Tree program brought in thousands of dollars in personalized Christmas gift donations for 167 individuals in 42 different Moapa Valley families.

Mack Lyon teacher Crystal Blackwell explained that the Angel Tree program has become a tradition at the school over the past 6-7 years. Blackwell works with school counselors throughout Moapa Valley to come up with a list of families that may need a little help for the holidays. She also coordinates with Penny Vallone from Cappalappa Family Resource Center to come up with additional families.

Blackwell said that no one on the giving end knows the identity of any of these families. “I don’t even know who they are,” she said. “We are just given some basic information about each person: their age, gender, clothing and shoe sizes, their needs and their wants for Christmas. That is all. Other than that it is completely anonymous.”

Each of the recipients are assigned a special angel which are used to decorate Angel Trees on the Mack Lyon campus. “In the past we have had all of the Angel Trees set up in the library,” Blackwell said. “But this year, because there were so many, we decided to do it a little differently. We set up an Angel Tree in every English classroom.”

This worked well since every student at Mack Lyon takes an English class, Blackwell said.
Students were encouraged, but not required, to pick one of the angels off of the tree. By doing so, they volunteered to go Christmas shopping for that person, based on the information given.
“Usually each angel gets about three items; sometimes more,” Blackwell said. “People are usually spending between $50 and $100 on their angel.”

In addition, this year an anonamous donor from the community gave a $1,000 cash donation to the program. This funded a large number of angels, plus helped purchase what Blackwell called “filler gifts” such as stocking stuffers, etc.

The Angel Tree drive started at the school just before Thanksgiving. All donations were due at the school by Friday, Dec. 8.

Then the work began for Blackwell and her crew. She and a group of devoted students from the school’s Beta Club and National Junior Honors Society chapter got together to compile all of the gifts into their appropriate family groups.

“It was a lot of work,” Blackwell said of the sorting process. “The kids were great to help out. They were willing to stay late after school to work on it. On that Friday, we stayed until 5:30 in the evening to get things finished.”

The donations were delivered to Cappalappa Family Resource Center on Monday, Dec. 11. “Their staff then made calls to the families and made sure that everything was distributed,” Blackwell said.

Blackwell was pleased with the growth in the program that was experienced this year. “We just want to thank the whole community for their efforts in making it successful,” she said. “It is amazing what we are able to accomplish each year with this. And it is good knowing that all of these donations stay right here in the valley to help neighbors and friends here. It is just impressive what can be done when we work together as a community.”