Schools
Liberty Middle School Students Raise $4,000 Selling Pastries in Honor of Fallen Classmate
Students at Liberty Middle School, who had a classmate killed earlier this year, raised money selling Butter Braid bread and donated proceeds to a fund for underprivileged students named after the fallen student.
Don't let nutritionists – or your mom – fool you. Butter Braid pastry is good.
Just ask Col. Parker Schenecker and students at Liberty Middle School.
Schenecker was at the center of a tragedy in January when his wife Julie was charged in the shooting deaths of the couple's two children, Calyx, 16, and Beau, 14.
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Calyx ran cross country at King High School, where she was enrolled in the International Baccalaureate program. Beau was a student at Liberty Middle where he also played a soccer and was a member of the Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) and would have been a freshman at Freedom High School this school year.
So in a show of tremendous support for their former classmate, students at Liberty Middle School sold the Butter Braid pastries to raise funds for the Calyx and Beau Schenecker Memorial Fund, a program that offers support in leadership, athletic, and visual arts for promising Tampa Bay area teenagers.
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The Liberty students, using the delicious desert, raised $4,000. As a result, Parker Schenecker, at a ceremony Thursday at Liberty Middle School to award a very large-sized check for the memorial fund, could be seen in the back of the school's media center cutting a matching check, albeit using a significantly smaller-sized personal checkbook.
Roughly 100 students, many dressed in Sunday best, attended the formal ceremony, ringed with school officials.
“We celebrate what [Calyx and Beau] meant” to the local schools, Liberty Principal James Ammirati said.
The check presentation clearly touched Schenecker, who while speaking, had to pause for a brief moment to gather his emotions.
“Just remember that they are here with you,” Schenecker said. “I cannot thank you enough..." It was then Schenecker's voice began to crack and he paused, clearing his throat to compose himself.
“Let's hope 2012 has calmer seas.”
Schenecker is an Army colonel stationed at Central Command at MacDill Air Force Base.
“Thanks for caring and what this will mean to our community,” Schenecker said. “Thank you for including me on your team. It means a lot to me.”