Every year the third-grade teachers at Belle Sherman Elementary School— Josh Dresen, Austin Fay, and
Eric Reiff–engage their students in at least one local and one international fundraiser. In 2022,
Sustainable Finger Lakes was chosen to receive the local donation.
For their fundraiser, the Belle Sherman Elementary third grade classes worked together to produce a
poetry book. They wrote the poems, created the artwork, decided how much to sell the books for, and
created title ideas. Then they voted for their favorite title, class by class, and ultimately chose “Poems by
Planets: A book that rocks by 3 rd graders who want more poetry and less COVID.” It features poetry from the Neptune Room, the Moon Room, and the Star Room at the school.
The students promoted the book to staff and family members in order to send more customers to
Odyssey Bookstore, where the book was sold. Odyssey (another wonderful partner with the Finger Lakes
Climate Fund) passed 100% of the profits on to Sustainable Finger Lakes. Teacher Josh Dresen says:
“We decided to donate to your awesome organization, because we all loved your mission statement of
‘promoting equity’ and working towards a healthier environment. These are values we learn about and
discuss all year long throughout the day, especially during Social Studies and Science.”
Sustainable Finger Lakes is so honored to be the recipient of the Belle Sherman Elementary School 3rd
Graders’ 2022 fundraiser!
