2026 Semester of Service Projects

Our mission was to restore and build new garden beds, storage bins, and benches for young children and teachers to learn and grow in an enhanced outdoor learning environment. By partnering with Angie Soda from Davis Child Care Center, we were able to build 8 new garden beds, and 2 new benches by the end of May. 

The City of Oshkosh worked with juniors Matty and Virginia to plan and host the 10th Annual Bike Osh. This city-wide event encourages and promotes the utilization of bicycle infrastructure while fostering a bike-friendly environment with the goal of making Oshkosh safer and more environmentally sustainable. This year’s event was a great time for all, and we are looking forward to next year!

QPR Institute says, “Both CPR and QPR are part of systems designed to increase the chance of survival in the event of a crisis.” Community For Hope is a local organization here in Oshkosh and has been running for 25 years. This organization focuses on suicide prevention, and helps with that through various educational opportunities. Four Communities students chose to further dive into this organization for their semester of service project. Tucker, Paige, Sonya, and Sammie decided to partner with Sarah Danahy (Executive Director of Community For Hope) to host a QPR training session for their community. They helped educate their local city on suicide awareness and hosted a successful event.

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People of all ages struggle with poor cell phone use. Our juniors, Lilyana and Campbell partnered with SMART Social to focus on our youth in the Oshkosh community to stop the problem before it's too late. Lilyana and Campbell visited fifth-grade classrooms at Oaklawn and Emmeline Cook Elementary Schools to present to students on the dangers of technology, focusing on different topics each month. These presentations are in preparation for the culminating event, “Power of the Purse,” where they will share their learning throughout the project.

The Oshkosh Community Bike Program provides bikes for people in Oshkosh unable to obtain other reliable transportation. The program takes in damaged bikes and refurbishes them to give out. Juniors Caden Ames and Seamus Rutkowski worked in collaboration with the program's founder Steve Sagmeister and other volunteers to fix over 31 bikes to distribute at Read Elementary School right here in Oshkosh.

To improve the Winnebago County Best Friends Dog Park, Ella, Abby, Cooper, and Phanique built a picnic table and an A-frame obstacle, and they also planted three trees with the guidance of their community partner, Kyle Vergin. To fund the project, they cold-called a bunch of local stores and people to ask for donations for their final event. They wrapped everything up with a huge ribbon-cutting event, and it was awesome to see the community come out to support what they made.

A common problem in the Oshkosh community is a lack of green space. Emmi and Emily partnered with the Oshkosh Parks Dept and collaborated with an Oshkosh Arborist, Travis Derks. They hosted an event educating the community about the importance of trees: “Rooted in Reading-" a community engagement event that included ‘Reading with an Arborist’. People who attended the event learned more about the importance of planting a diversity of trees, how to plant trees, and what to look for when identifying trees. Participants also left with a tree.

Kids all around Oshkosh are exposed to substances and peer pressure. Breakwater's mission is to prevent this or at the very least educate kids. This is an organization that tries to combat youth substance abuse by meeting with kids around Oshkosh educating them on the harms of drugs/alcohol. Ally and El worked this year to help facilitate meetings every Wednesday. Then they finished up by hosting a sober/substance free night and the Boys and Girls Club. This was a very successful event with food, games, and even karaoke!

For their junior project, Callie, James, and Adilynn partnered with Oaklawn Elementary School to give the school's gardens a well-needed reset. After meeting with the principal, Mr. Johanknecht, to plan the project they decided the garden beds required entirely new woodwork. The team managed the process of sourcing the lumber, designing the layout, building the new structures, and replanting the gardens with brand new plants.

Our communities program recently held the 4th Annual Arbor Day Celebration at Oshkosh North’s conservation space known as Akan Acres to prioritize the mental health benefits of green spaces and the importance of tree planting. Supported by the Oshkosh Parks Department and Wisconsin State Representative Lori Palmeri, the event featured the planting of a donated tree and the reading of a proclamation given by the mayor, The event also highlighted the commitment of the Programs Green Team to maintain the conservation area all year round. The efforts of everyone involved have enabled Oshkosh North to remain one of the schools to receive the rare Tree Campus USA award, this award takes hard work to earn and very few schools get this reward. This reward will continue to be our goal to maintain while making the community greener and better.

Knowledge is power. April of 2025, a sting operation occurred where 10 men were arrested for participating in human trafficking. Human trafficking is still a big issue, both in Oshkosh and in the world. Juniors Abbey and Brynn worked together with the Damascus Road Project to spread awareness of the signs of human trafficking. They did this through social media posts on Damascus Road as well as a presentation to freshmen health classes. Brynn and Abbey’s hope is that their presentation will reach anyone at risk and inform them of ways to avoid those who pose a danger to them.