The Jamesville-DeWitt Central School District’s special education classroom, the Tecumseh Learning Pad, is excited to host its 12th annual Lemonade Stand this week. The lemonade stand is held in April to coincide with National Autism Acceptance Month.
Stands are available to students and staff at all school buildings, the Transportation Department, and the District Office this week. The Tecumseh Elementary School stand will be hosted on Friday, April 4. No donation is too small. The proceeds will be distributed between the Central New York Autism Society of America and ARISE Adaptive Design. The stand raised more than $7,000 last year.
Senior Olivia Clark spearheaded the expansion of the event to J-D High School and J-D Middle School as part of her Senior Capstone project in conjunction with the 12:1 (3:1) special education classrooms in those buildings. It’s a full circle moment for Olivia, whose sister Morgan helped create the Learning Pad’s first lemonade stand.
Olivia also worked with staff to design and sell a special “Tecumseh Learning Pad Lemonade Stand” t-shirt/sweatshirt that is raising additional proceeds. Shirt orders are being extended and will be available Tuesday, April 1 through Tuesday, April 8.
To get ready for the fundraiser, 12:1 (3:1) special education classroom students and their peers prepared hundreds of lemonade bottle kits and created Autism acceptance pins that will also be for sale. Special thanks to Wegmans, Target, friends, and families for donating supplies.
Learning Pad and Jamesville-DeWitt students will also take part in the Autism Acceptance Walk, scheduled for 10 a.m. on Saturday, April 26 at Jamesville Beach.