ATLANTA—Students and faculty members took the opportunity this summer to give their time and talent to serve others, a tenet of Christ the King School.

While many hit the pool and tennis courts and played a few more video games, some CKS students served the community. On June 1, Nicole Pizzo, Mary Elizabeth Westenberger, Molly Foy and Alex Ribic acted as ball girls for the Special Olympics 2014 State Summer Games at Emory University.

“The girls really enjoyed it and never lost their enthusiasm (or their smiles) throughout the day,” said Maria Pizzo, Nicole’s mother. “I think they also learned a valuable lesson about putting life’s ‘problems’ in perspective.”

Many students are called to serve because they are inspired by their teachers, other students or parishioners.

Kathryn Ledlie, first-grade teacher at Christ the King School, spent a week in Ashland, Montana, on a Catholic Heart Work Camp mission trip with Christ the King’s Life Teen. The group joined 300 teens at St. Labre Indian School, a school that educates the children of nearby reservations in the Catholic traditions. Each morning, the teens and other adult leaders celebrated Mass inside a gigantic stone tipi chapel on school grounds before heading to work.

After Mass, groups traveled to 39 different homes on the surrounding reservations to aid the homeowners in tasks like house painting, yard work, rebuilding porches and decks, and replacing siding.

“The days were long and exhausting, but we found energy in each other and in the work that we were doing,” said Ledlie. “We were able to build relationships with homeowners and each other; many of the people we will never see again, but … proved so important for those five days in Montana.”