With COVID-19 having thrown a wrench in many of Jesuit’s traditional service projects, the school has forged new partnerships with several local organizations that offer outdoor, socially distant service opportunities focused on the environment. 

This past Saturday, a group of 30 juniors and seniors planted trees across the Mid-City neighborhood with Sustaining Our Urban Landscape (SOUL), an organization devoted to increasing the tree cover in New Orleans. With 100 live oak, holly, and magnolia trees staged in the Banks Street parking lot, students split into teams and tackled plantings on streets well known to the Blue Jay community: Baudin, S. Solomon, S. Alexander, S. Hennessey, Cleveland, S. Lopez, S. Cortez, and S. Telemachus. This event followed a similar event with SOUL back in the fall, when students planted dozens of trees in Lake Oaks Park, near the University of New Orleans. 

In addition to these urban tree plantings, Blue Jay students have ventured out to the outer edges of the metro area. At the start of the Mardi Gras break, over two dozen upperclassmen woke up early, bundled up to protect against near freezing temperatures, and traveled by airboat from a Braithwaite boat launch to a St. Bernard Parish marsh where they planted 500 cypress trees with the Pontchartrain Conservancy. In addition to enjoying the satisfaction of planting so many trees, the students benefited from a presentation by the Pontchartrain Conservancy’s coastal scientists on the importance of restoring Louisiana’s coast. 

Any students itching to get out into New Orleans’s beautiful spring weather and serve the community should be on the lookout for information on a painting project at Tad Gormley Stadium scheduled for Friday, Mar. 12.