This is a contributor-submitted Voices piece. Want to join the conversation? We invite you to write for us. Learn how to share your voice here.
University School of the Lowcountry Intermediate School Director Alauria Corbin is here to share how a small act of thoughtfulness and kindness of a school leader went on to impact the community in greater ways than expected.
I work at a small private school in Mount Pleasant called University School of the Lowcountry and our Head of School has been a shining example during this pandemic. Jason Kreutner is our leader and he is not one for accepting accolades or doing things only to get noticed - he’s ALL heart and service, truly all heart and service.
On an individual basis, he sent each and every one of his teachers something to help them get through these crazy times. For me, it was a box of vegan snack foods from The Good Grocer. For a coworker with young kids, it was a box of family board games. The list goes on, and no one knew he had done it for everyone until we started chatting about our surprise gifts that had magically shown up!
For the greater community, he made sure on the day we found out schools were closing that he reached out to our long time friends and let them know we would not forget them or their students during these uncertain times; That we would, somehow, someway, show up to help in some capacity. (These long time friends are our often underserved communities like Midlands Park Elementary, Pinehurst Elementary, and South Santee Senior Center. We have relationships with these communities thanks to our participation with Trident United Way‘s Day of Caring and other activities we do every year.)
While many of us were scared and worried, Jason Kreutner showed us what to do next – the next right thing. He asked what these communities needed, then reached out to our USL families, his Snee Farm swim team members, and goodness knows who else to get what was most needed.
This has resulted in eleven weeks of ongoing donations and support in these communities. Working alongside some of our Charleston County School District friends, he has created multiple small teams of people to go out into these communities every Friday after gathering donations at our school each week.
What started out as a promise to not forget about our friends has transformed into an opportunity to do something to help some of the folks who need it most.
We plan to continue these efforts throughout the summer by accepting donations (books and toys, shelf-stable food items, monetary gifts) and continuing to show up with our trained volunteers to help.
