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YCREA Day of Caring: 2026

A statewide community project was initiated by MEA-Retired in 2010. Each county association was asked to “Do Something Special” for a school in their county. This was organized in memory of the events of September 11, 2001.

This year YCREA selected Lyman Elementary School for our annual Day of Caring Event. Our members brought school supplies and monetary donations to our September meeting. Carol Scott, a member who was active in the PTO at Lyman Elementary School and her husband, who taught at Massabesic Middle School, delivered our donations to the principal, Cindy Pellerin, on September 15th. This is the 17th year that we have participated in the Day of Caring Event. We appreciate the generosity of members who continue to support this program every year. It’s a great feeling to be doing something for others and retired educators want their efforts to support students.

YCREA Day of Caring: 2025

YCREA selected the Hanson Elementary School in Lebanon, Maine as the recipient of our 2025 Day of Caring efforts to do “Something Special” for a school in York County. At our September meeting we collected school supplies as well as monetary donations. The pictures below show our trunk full of supplies. We also presented Principal Carmen Carpenter, a sizeable check, to be used as needed for students and staff.

We were also able to visit with a new kindergarten teacher who was a recipient of an education scholarship from YCREA four years ago. This was an unexpected surprise to have a recipient of our scholarship starting her first year of teaching at the school we had selected for our Day of Caring. This is our sixteenth year of Day of Caring Projects and we have to give a big shout out to our members who every year exceed our expectations to do “Something Special” for a school in our county.

YCREA Day of Caring: 2024

We had another awesome Day of Caring Event. This was our 15th Annual Day of Caring Project and we spent it at the Great Works School in South Berwick with Principal Jerry Burnell and some of his staff (current and retired) along with several long time YCREA members and one brand new member (welcome to retirement Deb B.). The weather was beautiful and Jerry had a wish list ready for us to tackle. I think we did an amazing job and pretty much completed our assignments.

We outlined a playground sized map of the United States that was painted later in the week. We put wood chips around a tree near the entrance to the school, cleared brush around the edge of the lower playground, and painted trim around a couple of the school entrance doors. The last item on the list was staining an outdoor shed. Thanks to ongoing support from the Newington Staples we had a gift card for the school. Thanks to MEA-Retired, YCREA and the generosity of individual members of YCREA, we were able to present Mr. Burnell with a sizeable check to use for the benefit of his staff and students over the year. Nothing feels better than working with a group of people who just want to do something to make life a little better for someone else. What a great day!

YCREA Day of Caring 2023

2021 Day of Caring

This is our twelfth year of our MEA Retired Educators Day of Caring. Each MEA-RETIRED County Association is asked to doing something special for a school in their county on or around September 11th to honor the memory of those who gave their lives on September 11, 2001.
We had a beautiful day, lots of food and a great feeling of doing something nice for someone else. And the final extra special activity was to share pizza with the Saco Firefighters.
We worked at the Young School in Saco with four of our members and the principal and three members of their parent group and school board members. We were a small but mighty group and accomplished all that was planned. We are especially excited about the playground games we painted. Thanks to Staples, we had a filled school box for each of the students. We were also able to present the principal a donation from our York County Retired Educators and Maine Retired Educators.

2019 Day of Caring
In 2019 we partnered with Education Majors from St Joseph’s College and completed projects needing attention at Marshwood Middle School.

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2018 Day of Caring was most successful!

On Sept 15, 2018, we partnered with Education students from St Joseph’s College
and completed many projects at Line Elementary School.

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2017 Day of Caring Dayton Consolidated Schools
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2016 Day of Caring
Jameson Elementary School
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2015 Day of Caring Eliot Elementary School

We partnered with Education majors from St Joseph’s College
for some extra hands. We painted the bottom half of the gym, organized a student activities storage closet, raked mulch, and did some gardening from 8 am to 2:30 pm.

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2014 Day of Caring Acton Elementary School

YCREA members teamed up with St. Joseph’s College students along with parents and staff from Acton Elementary. The principal had a long list of chores that needed to be done which included painting, cleaning out a shed, making curtains, etc. Lunch was served, and a good time was had by all! Retired educators ROCK!

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