TINTON FALLS – In what has become a time-honored winter tradition at Ranney School, the community again teamed up with the nonprofit Holiday Express during its fourth annual concert on Thursday, Dec. 6, in Panther Hall.
Combined with this year’s $10,000 donation, the school has given more than $55,000 to Holiday Express since 2009 – donating 100 percent of ticket sales to help those in need during the holiday season and throughout the year.
Founded by restaurateur Tim McLoone, Holiday Express is an organization of 1,300 volunteers and more than 80 professional musicians who travel across the tri-state area delivering music, food, gifts, financial support and friendship to adults and children who are physically and mentally disabled, living with AIDS or homeless.
The Ranney concert offered performance favorites, including “Higher and Higher” and “Nobody Ought to be Alone on Christmas” with Ranney’s Upper School Chorus on vocals and Head of School Lawrence S. Sykoff on guitar.
“We are so lucky to have someone like Tim who is always thinking about helping people,” Sykoff said after he and parents’ association President Mimi Keenan presented a check to McLoone. “Year after year Holiday Express gets together with their band of angels and reaches out to those in need. There are a lot of heroes in our lives … you are looking at one right now.”
Over the past four years, Ranney students, faculty and friends have shown their appreciation for the organization and all they do for the community.
McLoone told the audience, “We come to Ranney each year because you have the ‘all-encompassing’ feeling about this. Your students have volunteered at our warehouse; items are being collected all around campus … Ranney stands alone with this kind of thing.”
In addition to collecting the needed items in designated bins throughout the school, Ranney participated in various other community service opportunities including the continuous support to Project Rebuild and Recover, the Lower School’s Toys for Tots collection, a canned and boxed goods collection for Lunch Break, the National Honor Society’s food drive and the upcoming RSPA Book Fair which will contribute to Project Night Night.
