The students at Locust Grove Mennonite School are on a cleaning streak.

Kylee took out the trash.

Kelly cleaned the litter box.

Molly brushed the dog.

Erika cleaned the attic.

Ten-year-old Faith Dinger and her seven-year-old brother, Chad, washed windows for their mom.

"It's the children's version," said their mother, Stephanie Dinger. "The complete opposite of mine, streaks and all. But I'm leaving them for now."

Faith and Chad are among the school's 237 students in prekindergarten to eighth grade who are focusing on cleaning — but it's not because they are studying germs.

In honor of Valentine's Day, they are focusing on love.

Instead of buying and anticipating cards and candy, they are doing chores to earn money for Heifer International, a humanitarian assistance organization that sends livestock to families in need around the world to end hunger.

Those families in turn "pass on the gift" by giving an offspring from their livestock to a neighbor.

This year marks the school's 50th anniversary of the Valentine's Day giving project.

And the kids are pulling out all the stops to make it special. They hope to raise $3,410 by Friday to purchase an ark of chicks, ducks, geese, bees, rabbits, goats, sheep, pigs, llamas, water buffalo and heifers.

The project kicked off in an assembly on Jan. 29, when the kids sang "We can get the llama" to the conga line tune.

In a rousing assembly for students in kindergarten to third grade on Monday, they sang, "If you're happy and you know it, quack like a duck," then another chorus "moo like a cow," another "baa like a lamb," and so on.

First-grade teacher Elizabeth Hackman dressed as a duck and aide Carolyn Ali as a bunny to entertain the kids.

"Hop to it," Ali urged the students.

Behind them a chart showed their progress in dollars and an ark to show their progress in livestock.

"The coolest thing about giving up Valentine's Day and the emphasis on self is to show love for people far away, people they may never meet, to change families' lives," said Jessie Newswanger, who teaches third grade.

Teachers Lisa Buch and Cheryl Oschegar serve with Newswanger on the committee for the project.

Newswanger said it is the students' favorite project of the year "...because it connects children to real needs they can fill."

In previous years, students have collected baby clothes for infants in Africa, school kits for children in Bosnia and health kits for children caught in mud slides in South America.

This is the first year in Newswanger's 27 years at the school at 2257 Old Philadelphia Pike that the project has focused on Heifer International.

Most of the animals serve purposes of milk and egg production and reproduction and are not intended for slaughter. The sale of milk and eggs helps families earn money to send their children to school.

Locust Grove's opening assembly featured a video of Third World school children with animals they received from Heifer International.

"It brings a tenderness to their hearts," Newswanger said.

"They're very aware of all the blessing we have in the United States, but sometimes children are overlooked as instruments of change in the world."

The project ties in the school's theme for the year: "Living Beyond Ourselves."

"We're helping them see the world as a community, where we can all help each other," Newswanger said.

CONTACT US: jkern@LNPnews.com or 481-6028