Jenna Sanders (12) looks to the future when working with kids and looks to the past when studying her Jewish heritage.

“Working with kids is really cool because they value you as someone that’s older,” Jenna said. “Whether they know it or not, later in their life, you know you had an impact on how they grew up to become the person they are.”

Jenna first worked with kids as an assistant teacher as a rising freshman at Congregation Beth Am, her Jewish temple, teaching a class about Judaism and its values as well as arts and crafts.

“I first joined the temple because I was going to Hebrew school for my Bat Mitzvah,” she said. “I wanted to do some community service, not to think about any requirement— [I] forgot to report the hours—but be fully immersed in it.”

Jenna worked at her temple for a second summer, and still attends monthly reunions. She sees many of the kids she worked with regularly, and has even attended a few of their Bar Mitzvahs.

As a rising junior, Jenna taught worked at the Boys and Girls club teaching underprivileged elementary school school students math and reading.

“We partnered with Camp Galileo, and they created a curriculum for us every year,” Jenna said. “This year the theme was Arts in Africa and the Serengeti. We taught the kids about what the Serengeti is and what kind of animals live there.”

Jenna was originally drawn to the program due to her belief in equal opportunity.

“The kids were at reading levels far below what I expected,” she said. “Sometimes, I want to be judgmental. They don’t have parents who read to them at home. Some of [the parents] can’t read and write at all. I remember we had to sign a parent’s name to check a student out because he couldn’t read and write. That barrier is different from what I know. But it’s not wrong, and it’s not necessarily the parents’ fault if they can’t spend the time with their kids.”

Over her time volunteering, Jenna learned to set an example for her younger students.

“The kids that look up to you matter the most,” she said. “Sometimes, they’ll just try to be your best friend. It’s important for me to be not only a friend but a teacher for them. When they had trouble reading, I [don’t] just read to them, but help them how to do it independently. It is really cool to figure out a balance between being a friend and being a teacher.”

When not volunteering with children, Jenna often finds herself studying Jewish history.

“In an community service class during 8th grade, I had a couple of weeks in a session on the history of Holocaust that our Holocaust scholar was teaching us,” she said. “I just got completely immersed in that and I found it fascinating. That summer I went to Israel, visiting Yad Vashem, which is the Holocaust memorial museum there. I kept watching movies, reading books, it was just so interesting to me.”

Ms. Pianko’s History of the Holocaust class has allowed Jenna to continue pursuing her interest in her Jewish heritage.

“It’s my favorite class ever taken in high school by far,” Jenna said. “It’s a class I don’t even want to leave the classroom, just don’t want to miss a minute of it. We are two months [into] it, so we only have so much time left in that class. I am constantly learning new things that I had no idea about it before. That the fact that I didn’t know about them before, is almost frustrating but also motivates me wanting to learn more now that I have the opportunity.”

Kristin LeBlanc (12), one of Jenna’s closest friends, appreciates Jenna’s open mindedness.

“What makes Jenna really special is that she takes the time to research and take other people’s perspectives into account before forming an opinion of her own,” Kristin said.