More Do The Right Thing winners
The Cape Coral Police Department recognized seven students Wednesday during the February Do The Right Thing ceremony at City Hall.
– Natalie McKenna, first grade, Oasis Elementary, daughter of Darren and Denise McKenna.
Students at Oasis Elementary are asked to think of others first and give back to their community meeting core values of kindness, compassion and respect. On several different occasions Natalie has modeled these values. Natalie has participated in putting baskets together for Oasis students in need and she has donated new items to the school to use to reward students for outstanding behavior. More recently, though, she has been raising money for the less fortunate. After meeting her original goal, she took her project to school and succeeded in doubling her goal.
– Connor Guyton, fifth grade, Christa McAuliffe Elementary, son of Paul and Jennifer Guyton.
Connor is a member of the Kiwanis K-Kids. Over the holiday, K-Kids ran a food drive and packed up boxes of food for 25 families. Connor enjoyed this activity but at the same time realized that there were many more families that needed assistance so he went home and told his parents that he wanted to do something additional to help. After researching some options, Connor volunteered his time to work with a leadership program for middle and high school students called Respect Our School. They worked an entire day and into the night and through pouring rain asking for donations and were able to raise enough funds to purchase 300 turkeys for local families. Connor’s principal states, “Connor is only 11 years old yet has an internal drive for civic duty.”
– Robert Manning, ninth grade, Cape High, son of Pam Manning.
Robert was nominated by his neighbor, David Jonathan, who visited Robert’s family and mentioned that he needed to hire someone to do some yard work for him. A couple days later Robert and a friend came to his door asking if they could do the yard work as they were bored and wanted to earn some money so they could go and have some fun. Mr. Jonathon was so impressed that a 14-year-old was willing to work for entertainment money that he quickly agreed but soon realized that he had forgotten to charge the battery in the equipment they would need to use. He took a chance, and offered to pay the boys in advance so they could enjoy themselves with the understanding that they would come back to do the work. Mr. Jonathon tells me that Robert’s mom is doing a great job in raising him but despite that, Robert had been introduced to police officers through domestic violence and other incidents at an early age and is more than familiar with being around people who have broken the law. He also states that he wasn’t surprised that the very next morning Robert showed up to complete the job he had been paid for. We celebrate Robert for his integrity.