Tala and Bana Barham, twin sisters who are sophomores at Amos Alonzo Stagg High School in Palos Hills, have made a habit out of giving to others.
They’ve logged a combined 600 hours of service by volunteering last summer with the KidRec program at Moraine Valley Community College and other efforts through their school, topping a list of 90 District 230 students recognized earlier this month with the Cook County sheriff’s office Commitment to Service Award.
It’s not a milestone the sisters originally set out to conquer. They started out just trying to fulfill service requirements for graduation.
“I never thought of volunteering before until I actually needed to graduate. At first, it was to get the hours needed, but once I was introduced to camp volunteering at Moraine Valley by my friend, it felt like an opportunity,” Bana said.
Tala agreed.
“Actually I had no clue what I was getting into when Bana and I decided to do Summer Camp, but I loved it. I really like kids a lot,” she said.
They began volunteering last summer at KidRec, a summer program for children at the college in Palos Hills. They enjoyed it so much they started seeking other opportunities to help.
“After volunteering at the camp, I felt more confident about doing more productive things once school started up,” Bana said. “I have also continued to volunteer not only at the kids summer camp at Moraine Valley, but also at Stagg events with my friends.”
Meeting new friends was another benefit of their efforts, including their fellow counselors at the MVCC summer camp.
“They have become a family to me,” Bana said, “I would be lying if I said it was all fun and rainbows, but when it was gloomy, the other counselors and now my best friends were there to comfort me.”
Volunteering as a sibling team also helped them get started.
“Without my friends and Bana I wouldn’t have gone to volunteer there,” Tala said. “I created a great connection with the kids, seeing them grow up makes me very happy. Even if I couldn’t get service hours from it I would still go no matter what. Being there gave me new friends, taught me leadership and how to be patient.”
Along the way, they’ve each compiled over 300 service hours — much more than they needed for their school graduation requirement and over three times that needed to win the award from the county sheriff’s office, which issued a statement praising “these students’ commitment and talent.” Since 2014, the sheriff’s office has presented the Commitment to Service award to nearly 2,000 high school students who have logged more than 100 hours of dedicated volunteer work, the statement said.
But few have earned as many as the Barham sisters. When not helping out at Moraine Valley’s KidRec program or at their school, they’re honing their multilingual skills. Born in Palestine, they moved to the United States when they were 9 years old.
“I’ve been visiting America my whole life so my English was always better than my Arabic,” Bana said. “I do have some siblings born in America, so it helped with my English too.”
After seeing the animated television program that is set in Paris, she added another language to her skill set.
“I started learning French last year and I am in my second year now,” Bana said. “One motivation that brought me to learn the French language was, as ridiculous as it sounds, ‘Miraculous Ladybug,’ but it turned out to be much more than that.”
Margie Ritchie is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.
