Students at Villanova High School have given back to benefit children going through difficult situations.
Over the course of several years, the students at Villanova High School have raised funds to purchase stuffed Dalmatian dogs and donate them to the fire services across Windsor and Essex County on a rotational basis each year.
Throughout the 2022-23 school year, students fundraised $1,400 and used the money to purchase 109 plush Dalmatians.
Windsor Fire and Rescue Services are the recipients this year, who will in turn hands them out to young children for comfort when they've been involved in traumatic events.
Fire Chief Stephen Laforet says it's a great commentary on the young people in the community that they see this need and did something about it.
"We were running low on stock this year and Villanova reached out to us, and we're thankful that they did. So now we have 109 that hopefully we never have to use, but if we do, they are there to help comfort a child," he said.
Laforet says the stuffed animals are used to help children in any sort of traumatic event.
"Could be a fire, could be a motor vehicle accident. We keep them in all of our vehicles so if we do notice that there's a child there we give that to them, and it's just a way to help out with some of the anxiety or stress they may be feeling in a bad situation."
Jolene Coste, Catholic Studies Department Head at Villanova, says the kids are doing the most selfless thing they can do because they have no idea who it is that's ever going to receive one of the stuffed animals.
"They have no idea who's going to get it, so it's really, really selfless of them to do it. And I think for teenagers who are classified as selfish so often they're doing something fantastic for our community, and not only just our community but the most vulnerable in our community," she said.
Coste says they went with Dalmatians for Windsor Fire because they're the fire department mascot.
"So that's why we go with the Dalmatians for them. When I utilize the police departments they get German Shepherds, and when it's EMS they get the St. Bernard because each of those are their mascot dogs."
Coste says she would be more than willing to help educate other schools on how to do this kind of program so that more stuffed animals can be put out to more police fire and emergency services in the region, because the need is always there for more.
This is the 15th year that Coste has been doing the adopt to donate program with her students.
