New Canaan High School Service League of Boys
Our Mission
New Canaan High School Service League of Boys is a philanthropic club for sons and parents to initiate and promote educational and charitable endeavors that foster community responsibility and leadership, as well as strengthen the parent-son relationship.
Members currently serve over 50+ philanthropic organizations with over 70 different events each school year. SLOBs is the largest service club at New Canaan High School with 250+ members and has served our community with over 35,000 volunteer hours.
History
In the early 1990s, the National Charity League (NCL) came to New Canaan from California thanks to a mother who was relocated from the west coast. NCL is a mother-daughter organization devoted to both education and charitable works in the community. After having been involved for a number of years in this organization with their daughters, Janice Luddy and Mary Beth Fessler thought there should be a similar organization for their sons. In the spring of 2004 they met with Ari Rothman, Assistant Principal at the high school, and Frank Tatto, guidance counselor, to propose a new club at NCHS that would be a parent-son organization committed to educating the boys about volunteerism and volunteering in the greater New Canaan area. While NCL is not part of a school community, they felt they could get this organization off the ground easier and with more student involvement, if it was part of our high school community. Their proposal was approved.
Over the spring and summer, Janice and Mary Beth gathered a group of mothers who had been involved in other similar philanthropic, community-minded organizations to form a board and begin preparation for the fall of 2004. They agreed that their sons would mirror their parents' positions/jobs and form a student board. They also thought each parent/son should serve for two years, especially when the club was just getting off the ground. The other founding members were Mercedes Papaharis, Chris McRedmond, Patti Rafalski, Toni-Ann Vittoria and Joan Reilly. The name Service League of Boys a.k.a. SLOBs was unanimously approved. The organization was met with enthusiasm with over 100 student members its first year.