The nonprofit Gwynn’s Island Civic League Foundation has been raising funds since its inception in January 2022 to support worthy educational and community causes on Gwynn’s Island and throughout Mathews County.

After its first fundraiser last year, the group began its philanthropic work, including awarding four college scholarships, the installation of a Little Free Library at the Gwynn’s Island Museum, and, most recently, fulfillment of a middle school class’s wish.

Thomas Hunter Middle School seventh grade English teacher Leslie Hudgins said that the foundation’s president, John Mathiesen, had visited a school board meeting and told the board there were funds available to help with school projects.

Hudgins had changed classrooms over the summer and, because her new room was rather dark and uninviting, she installed bird feeders on the windows outside to “bring some life to the room.”

Keeping the birds fed proved to be costly at eight pounds a week, so she decided to ask the foundation if it could buy some. In addition, while the bird feeders had initially been for her own enjoyment, she had found that they were having an impact on the students, who not only were learning about the birds but were finding that their presence helped calm their anxieties and relax them, as well. One day a student said, “Hey, Richard’s back,” and Hudgins discovered he meant a red-bellied woodpecker that had disappeared for a while.

“The kids said they’d named the birds,” she said. “They were creating and sharing stories about them.”

That gave Hudgins the idea of buying additional bird feeders for other classrooms to impact additional children.

Since her students had been working on persuasive essay writing in class, Hudgins had them put their skills to real-world use by writing letters to the foundation, explaining why the bird feeders were needed and asking for the funds.

They wrote about what they had learned by watching the birds daily, she said, including what seeds the birds like.
The result was that the foundation purchased eight additional bird feeders for the middle school, along with three 40-pound bags of bird seed, “enough to get us to the end of the year,” said Hudgins.

Some of the bird feeders will go to other seventh grade teachers who want one, while others might be handed out through a lottery of some sort.

“We’re very grateful and super excited to have the help,” said Hudgins.