Front Row, Left to Right:  Audry Vent, Greenbrier Elementary (Elementary School Volunteer Award); Jo Lynn Caffery, Baton Rouge Magnet High (Secondary School Volunteer Award);  Becky Poor of First United Methodist Church, Bernard Terrace Elementary (Community Partner Award);

Second Row, Left to Right:  Robert Hamilton, Northeast High (Secondary School Volunteer Award); Laura Shaw, Buchanan Elementary (Volunteer Organizer Award); and Michael Cavanaugh, Highland Elementary (Crystal Apple Award).

The second in his family to do so, Michael Cavanaugh won the Volunteers In Public Schools’ (VIPS) Crystal Apple Award April 22 at the organization’s annual awards event at University Baptist Church.  Cavanaugh and his wife, Carolyn, who won the award in 2008, are members of the church and have spent 13 years volunteering at Highland Elementary School.  Crystal Apple winners must have at least a decade of volunteerism at a school.

The Cavanaughs run Highland Elementary’s Reading Friends program of more than 300 people volunteering to read to students.  In addition, Michael Cavanaugh has helped build an outdoor playground and benches, installed classroom nameplates, built a reading loft, turned a storage area into a classroom and refurbished the teacher’s lounge.  The retired attorney also started a science club at the school this year to catalog animals and plants found on campus.

Volunteers In Public Schools on Thursday also gave Golden Apple awards to other outstanding volunteers: Jo Lynn Caffery, Baton Rouge Magnet High; Robert Hamilton, Northeast High; Audry Kent, Greenbrier Elementary; Xaviera Leon, Melrose Upper Elementary; Laura Shaw, Buchanan Elementary; and First United Methodist Church, adopted Bernard Terrace Elementary.