Giving Back to our Community

Our peace education curriculum is something unique to Montessori pedagogy. Through these projects, we strive to reinforce to the children the joy of sharing with those in need. Not only do the students get a chance to help others, but they are learning at the same time.

Our Daily Bread, Mansfield, Mansfield’s Food Pantry: Over the last 19 years, HOMS Students and their families have donated 10’s of thousands of non perishable food items to Our Daily Bread, Mansfield’s food pantry

For several years, HOMS made sure that no Senior on the Be a Santa to a Senior’s list through the Chamber of Commerce went without a sponsor.

Since 2008, HOMS families have organized and collected and donated several thousands of articles of children’s clothing to Clothes to Go, a charity that provides free clothing to anyone in need throughout MA, RI and around the Globe.

For several holiday seasons, members of the HOMS community donated gifts and gift cards so that the older children and teenagers on the extensive list of families in need would have Christmas gifts. Our students and families have also collected and rolled several hundreds of dollars in loose change for donations to Westside Benevolent Circle over the years.

In 2012 The HOMS community contributed to the more than 1,100 coats and jackets were collected and donated to Cradles to Crayons, supplying poor and homeless children with clothing and supplies.

Since 2004, our HOMS community has collected, sorted, counted and rolled loose change and made over one thousand dollars in monetary donations as well as donations of food and volunteer time to Friends of Mansfield’s Animal Shelter. HOMS has also made direct financial contributions.

Emily Miller (Founder and Head of school) is a breast cancer survivor having been diagnosed and treated in 2010-2011 for the disease. In 2010, HOMS families, led by the school’s administrator, formed a relay team in her honor and raised over $11,000.00 for cancer research during Mansfield’s Relay for Life in 2010.

The HOMS community has generously donated thousands of unwrapped toys to the Mansfield Rotary’s collection of toys over the last 16 years. These toys go to the West Side Benevolent Circle and the Marine Corps.

HOMS has contributed the Mansfield Rotary’s collection of Goods for Troops for over 12 years.

The HOMS community has volunteered during the Mansfield cleanup for over 11 years. HOMS has also financially sponsored the Keep Mansfield Beautiful.

We often give to local families in need. We provided a family who lost their home to fire in 2010 with some immediate necessities. When we learned that a local family’s terminally ill father’s dream was to see a New England Patriots football game at Gillette Stadium and we provided him with that experience.

We are an ongoing educational sponsor (since 2018) of the Mansfield Music and Arts Society.

From 2017-2020, HOMS sponsored the Hockomock YMCA Reach Out For Youth.

We are a sponsor for the Mansfield High School Football Team and the Mansfield High School Basketball Team.

Hands-On Montessori School was recognized by the UN in 2005 for its efforts in Peace Education. Emily Miller was recognized by the Commonwealth of MA as well as the Tri-Town Chamber of Commerce as Business Person of the Year in 2007 and Good Neighbor of the Year in 2019.

In 2005 the HOMS Community donated, packed and sent hundreds of personal care packages to the American Red Cross’s Hurricane Katrina Disaster Relief effort.

In February 2010, HOMS students collected loose change totaling $140.00 to donate to Haiti’s Earthquake Relief.

The HOMS community has donated hundreds of dollars from our collection of “Pennies For Peace” to Habitat for Humanity.

Heifer International is working to eradicate poverty and hunger through sustainable, values-based holistic community development. Heifer distributes animals, along with agricultural and values-based training, to families in need around the world as a means of providing self-sufficiency. For many years, our students have used our collected of “pennies for peace” to select and purchase animals for distribution through this project.

HOMS contributed $200 to the Montessori Administrator’s Association’s collective relief fund for those affected by Hurricane Irma along with an additional $1000.00 to the Blanchard’s Anguilla Children’s Fund: 100% of the donation went to the people of Anguilla to help with repairs and rebuilding after the devastation of Hurricane Irma.

Mareas Academy is a small school with limited resources in Costa Rica. In 2019 HOMS donated school supplies and teacher materials to try to help improve the educational opportunities for teachers and students there.