This past Friday, junior Tony Petruso held a charity event to help raise money for Peter and Paul Community Services, a charity dedicated to supplying housing and resources to the homeless. However, this event was a much bigger blossoming than the original seed. The seed? Well it was, a project assigned in Mrs. Nancy Holden-Nims’ Leadership class.

Tony has known about the project since the very first day of his second semester, way back in January. Holden-Nims recalls how he was slow to get the project started at first.

“I was thinking ‘I know Tony; I know he can do this. What’s going on?’” said Holden-Nims.

After he did get the ball rolling, though, it was word of mouth that got the event as large as it was. Donors contributed free T-shirts, free Smoothie King and even their time. Students like Nick Bone heard of the cause and were drawn to it.

“I know homeless people personally, so that alone inspired me to help out. Plus, Tony was in a jam and needed an emcee and I’ve known him for a long time; helping him wasn’t even a question,” said Bone.

Petruso wasn’t concerned about the grade he would receive in class. His love for service and soccer inspired him to create this night of charity. Petruso was also hoping to make something fun, which is what helped him to exceed the expectations of his teacher.

“I am amazed by Tony’s project. It’s very interesting to give a class an assignment and see what kids do with it… [What he did] is definitely not the bar that I expect students to achieve so it was way beyond what was expected,” said Holden-Nims.

Petruso was also expressly thankful for the connections he and his dad have in the St. Louis soccer community that were able to take his event as far as it went. After the GoFundMe was up for about 15-20 days, the donations began to take off and social media began to pick up the event. Though he is not allowed to disclose information about the total amount of money raised yet, he is still selling leftover T-shirts for people to buy and keeping the GoFundMe and his email open for donations. If interested, email him at [email protected].

As the excitement from the event begins to die down, Petruso has had time to reflect on the event and what the future may hold.

“While I was happy with attendance, I wish even more could have come out. I don’t know if this will happen in the future… Maybe I can get one of the great clubs at St. Dominic to help me do it again,” said Petruso.

According to Petruso, the players and coaches are already planning another game in a few weeks at Peter and Paul’s street soccer court, only proving how influential this past Friday was. No words can express how gracious the event was, considering everything put into it is going straight back to Peter and Paul Community Services. But for now, it’s clear that junior Tony Petruso deserves a pat on the back for the hard work he put into the event, taking it beyond his grade.