Lights dim and a screen flashes to an image of crumbled pieces of paper reading self deprecating insults. A girl begins unraveling these papers and reads the hurtful comments. As she begins to break down, two boys come over and together the three of them throw away the insults. “We must lift each other up,” the message of the PSA reads.

On March 23, the seats of the Alan Harvey theatre were filled with students and adults who came to watch a showcasing of PSAs, videos that sophomore English classes made to address societal issues and promote solutions to these issues.

The Service Learning Club, a club consisting of students whose goal is to implement service learning into the school curriculum, organized the film festival to fundraise for the costs of service trips and activities that they organize, such as the morning of Day On the Green.

“We wanted to create an opportunity where it’s not just money put in a jar but instead says ‘look at some of the cool stuff that students are doing, such as the PSAs,”club advisor Courtney Goen said.

Whether it is transportation costs for students to visit soup kitchens, or supplies for sophomores to build solar ovens, the expenses of service learning are much higher than many people realize, Goen said.

“It’s not something you can do without funds,” Goen said.

Club president senior Mariah Papy said they chose to host the film festival to both fundraise and promote the Service Learning Club.

“Our main goal for the night, along with raising money, was getting the word out there about the importance of service learning in our school,” Papy said.

Goen said that the purpose of the PSAs is to bring attention to a cause and spread that message which is a really powerful service.

“It might not permanently change or radicalize your behavior but you at least might think about it and you might go home and tell somebody about it so that the trickle of raising awareness is going on,” Goen said.

Goen said that service learning teaches students that there can be bigger meaning behind the work that you do.

“It’s not just something that you turn in to your English teacher, there’s more than that,” Goen said. “The work is not just for a grade, there’s actually a lot more power behind it.”

Club member sophomore Kate Broening said that the night was a success.

“Lots of people came so that was good,” Broening said.