WARWICK — The St. Peter School community celebrated National Adoption Day with many special activities. National Adoption Day raises awareness of the more than 108,000 children waiting to be adopted from foster care in the United States.
Students in kindergarten through second grade gathered together to listen to Principal Christine Desmarais read the story “God Found Us You” by Lila Tawn Bergen. She then shared her own personal adoption story, showing the students a photo of her parents on their wedding day.
The morning continued with another special guest reader, Krista Spano, who read “I Wished For You: An Adoption Story” by Marianne Richmond, and Anna Price, mother of second grader Samantha and kindergartener May, who shared the story of their adoption.
In a unique activity, second graders Jacob and Carter Harrell’s mother brought in beanie babies so that every student could choose one to adopt. For the official adoption ceremony, Leo Spano, an adoption attorney, administered an oath to the students to love, cherish, and protect their new babies. The students joyfully cheered at the end of the ceremony and began their task of passing out cupcakes to everyone in the school to thank them for their participation in collecting donations and making cards for foster families.
Families of students from preschool through grade eight donated socks, wipes and diapers for The Village for Rhode Island Foster and Adoptive Families. At the end of the day, students presented Executive Director Shannon Dos Santos with all the donations then listened as she read “The Star That Was You” by Cheramy Hassen.
“The most important message they were trying to convey was that there are so many different kinds of families, and they all have one thing in common — love,” said second grade teacher Anne Robinson.
