Last week, on Thursday, March 28,  Amber Coponiti, a psychology and world history teacher, delivered student-made cards to a retirement home. This is the second year in a row that she has urged her students to design cards, and she wants to make it an annual tradition for her psychology classes.  

“In psychology, one of the units we cover is adulthood and old age,” Coponiti said. “We talk a lot about the negatives of old age, but I like to bring out the positives as well. There’s a lot of elderly people who can do everything they used to; it just depends on their ability.”

Coponiti has been touched by cards in the past, and so she wants to share that joy.

“Any time I get a card from students it blows my mind. I get so excited, and I save them. I have an accordion folder at home, and anything a student has ever written me, cards that they’ve ever given me – I keep everything.”

Coponiti asks her psychology students to make the cards. Some students, she says, worry because they don’t feel that they’re artistic enough. If that is the case, she asks them to write a letter.

“Virginia Beach Schools talk[s] about community service and volunteering, and I felt this was a great way to transition that community service into the classroom,” said Coponiti. “And the students really like it.”

Both of the years she has delivered cards the cardmaking occurred in spring, as the curriculum reaches a point in which it is relevant.

“I think it’s a great time to do it because this is a time where you have Easter and Passover, and the whole theme of spring is renewal. It’s a great time to do this for the elderly and give them some color in their rooms.”

She recently found out that the retirement home she delivers to, Beth Sholom, offers visitation programs. Next year she hopes to take students on a field trip and allow students to hand their cards out individually.