beneficial arrangement for the students at Warwick Academy and the senior citizens at Westmeath.

Every Saturday four students from the school's Leo Club, the junior branch of the Paget Lions Club, spend time with the residents at Westmeath, helping them with various jobs such as cleaning windows and silver, giving the women manicures, playing games and taking the residents for walks.

It's a new project for the students and involves the whole Leo Club which has a membership of 61, the biggest they have been.

"We feel this has been mutually beneficial as the residents and the students enjoy it and have fun,'' said Leo Club president Samantha DeCouto, who is also deputy head girl and a house captain. "I personally enjoy going, I've been going ever since I moved back to Bermuda,'' said Miss DeCouto, who lived for ten years in Canada with her mother before returning to Bermuda to live with her grandparents. She says she didn't enjoy the high school system in Canada.

Her grandmother, Florence DeCouto, is the manager at Westmeath and it was through her that she started going to the senior citizens' home.

"I was going every Saturday but then I got a job at Phoenix,'' said the 17-year-old.

"When I got into the Leo Club I got them to get involved in it and every once in a while I take a day off and go there.'' It is an invaluable experience for the teenagers to spend time with the elderly who have many stories to tell. "They talk about their granddaughters and we read to them sometimes,'' Miss DeCouto stated.

"All the students in the Leo Club end up going at least once. They seem to enjoy it and some members want to go every week. It heightens people's self-esteem.'' Whitney Levon, a 14-year-old third year student at Warwick Academy, is one who has been going to Westmeath every Saturday. "She is pretty close with a couple of the residents,'' her president revealed.

Jennifer Gibson, the administrator at the rest home, says the residents, too, enjoy the presence of the young people.

"They like young people and look forward to them coming,'' she said. "It's nice that they want to do that. There is one young lady (Levon) who comes every week without fail which I think is commendable. She is very willing and very good.

"It's nice to see boys coming too, we don't get as many but when they do come they do a good job.'' The Warwick Academy Leo Club is the junior branch of the Paget Lions Club and according to Miss DeCouto, has been the largest Leo Club in the New York District for the last two years.

Vice president of the group is Jason Iris, while Bruno Teixeira is secretary and Arnario Shillingford the treasurer. Adult advisors include Joe Smith, president of Paget Lions and Robert Lennox, headmaster of Warwick Academy.

From the beginning of the academic year the Leo Club has been continuously raising money and helping others. At the end of the school year they will donate all the money raised to one particular charity, a decision that will be made by the membership in a vote in June. "Last year the money was donated to the Red Cross to help alleviate the hardship suffered by many in Ethiopia,'' explained Miss DeCouto, who added that the recent earthquake in India has now caught the attention of the Leo members.

So far the members have raised over $700 for P.A.L.S. from the sale of Bermuda Calendars, $326 for the Sunshine League from a November 25 tag day while $310 came from a White Elephant stall at the Warwick Academy Fair. Recently they also raised $128 from another project, "Hearts as Cards'' which they sold for 50 cents each.

"We also did a coin drive for WindReach on the second day of school and raised $68 but we haven't counted the primary school's money yet,'' said Miss DeCouto. The club is also collecting canned good for the Salvation Army as well as tabs off soda cans in order to make wheelchairs for those in need.

The club's biggest event of the year is the annual dinner on March 8, which marks their 10th anniversary this year.

"We usually raise a lot of money, over $1,000 every year,'' explained Miss DeCouto, who has been involved with the Leo Club for three years, with the last one as president. "The annual dinner is the big thing for the Leo Club and we encourage people to come to it. There is food and then a show afterwards. Last year we had a barbecue but this year it will be an international dinner, with different foods from around the world. Each member of the Leo Club will bring a dish and the food and nutrition department makes the deserts for us.'' As a senior at the school, she will be stepping down from the post at the end of the school year. She has just been accepted at Seneca College in Toronto, where she will study fashion merchandising for two years before moving on to New York University for a business degree.

In the meantime she is enjoying her stint as president of the Leo Club, a job made easier, she says, with the support she gets from vice president Jason Iris and the other officers. "I've spoken to the fourth years who will take over next year and they are going to try to start a project at WindReach or SPCA.''