The Wishbone Project is the largest service project at Immaculata-La Salle. It is hosted by the National Honor Society moderators and members, which allows ILS students to take part in collecting, packaging, and delivering decorated boxes of food to St. Mary’s Parish and St. John Bosco Parish so that many families are able to have a an enjoyable Thanksgiving dinner.

The Wishbone Project was created by group of students that were part of a class that Ms. Maria De La Guardia and Ms. Ana Garcia taught called Issues and Public Affairs. The class was created for students to understand how to better serve the community and give to the unfortunate.

The class started volunteering at Camilla’s House and giving to the people who needed food and clothing, which then encouraged the students to create a project that would help the families of Saint Mary’s who were in need. The students wanted the Saint Mary’s families to be able to have the same opportunity they have every year of creating a memorable experience in making a full Thanksgiving meal with pride and love.

“We talked very much about the dignity of the person. And the fact that in Thanksgiving, we all take so much pride and and love in creating this meal that our family sets two together, that that’s no small part of the beauty of Thanksgiving, it is not just the food but the fact that we make the food people take pride in the pie that they made or the recipe that they have,” Ms. Garcia explained.

“We thought about the students thought about how the families in Saint Mary’s because they may not be able to find food might also be missing out on that experience of Thanksgiving.”

Ms. Garcia, Ms. De La Guardia, and the students then came up with the idea to bring fresh food and ingredients of a Thanksgiving meal and put it in a box to give to the families, including a turkey, a large bag of rice, canned beans, a fresh pumpkin pie, sugar, cereals, and more. They started with 40 families and then two years later, the whole school was able to partake in the project.

Mrs. Maria Garces, who used to be a social studies teacher at ILS, took over National Honor Society and requested that the National Honor Society take the responsibility of the Wishbone Project. Mrs. Garces sought out to give boxes to not only Saint Mary’s Parish, but the Saint John Bosco Parish because she knew that they were immigrants in need of food and did not celebrate Thanksgiving.

Mrs. Garces’ legacy lives on through the students, faculty, and alumni who show their devotion, handwork, and compassion for the Wishbone Project. Every year they try to feed as many families as they can.

Every year the Wishbone Project is able to collect up 300 boxes or more, which leaves extra food for the families who may run out of food or ingredients after the Thanksgiving holiday. Ms. Garcia believes that what makes the Wishbone Project so special is the students concern for others for others, the generosity of the people who participate in the project, and the alumni who come back to help.

“The students concern was it was something that moved to be very much that they had gone to the point that they weren’t just thinking about what needed to be done but they were thinking about the greater the greater good of a person of the spirit of the person, so that moved me very much,” she explained with compassion.

“Just the generosity of people with the wishbone project, always moves me very, very much. And I think one of the things that moves me about wishbone is how when alum come back and comes around, how they’re the first ones to step up and want to be a part of it, which just tells me that this is, this is something that matters.”

The Wishbone a project is an important tradition that was created with love and determination. The boxes will be passed out on November 18th through the 19th.

Decorating the boxes will occur in the youth center on November 21st. The delivery of the boxes to the parishes will be held on November 27th after school.