Mountain Vista Sources of Strength student leaders led the advisement toy drive in partnership with Toys For Tots. As a school, Vista donated 1791 toys, counting Vista’s total of 1363 toys and Mountain Ridge Middle School’s 428 toys. The advisement class that donated the most toys was math teacher Paul Myers’ class with 91 toys.

Below are the leading advisement classes for each grade:

9th Grade- Tyler Gross (43 toys donated)
10th Grade- Lauren Miller (53 toys donated)
11th Grade- Paul Myers (91 toys donated)
12th Grade- Elyse Rhodes (52 toys donated)

This is the first year that Vista has participated in a toy drive involving the advisement classes. One of the coordinators, English teacher, Natalie Barnard was absolutely stunned that Vista and MRMS was able to reach such high numbers. “Never in my head did I imagine a total of 1,791 toys (1,363 of that from Vista alone)!!! Never did I imagine. I can simply say that we just made a ton of kids around our city very happy for their holiday morning, and for that I just want to say THANK YOU so very much for being involved,” wrote Barnard in an email thanking the teachers. All of the toys will be donated to disadvantaged Denver children in need of assistance during Christmas this year.

Photos below are courtesy of Racheal Matthews, Natalie and Gabe Barnard.