COMMUNITY UNITY

Share this article with a friend.

April 19, 2025

For information on admission to Notre Dame Prep, please click here.

Faith-based community service at Notre Dame Prep, a central component of student life at this academic powerhouse in Pontiac, gets exposure overseas in Milan, Italy.

Founded in 1942, Grace Centers of Hope is the oldest and largest homeless shelter in Michigan. In 2016, to address the increasing and alarming number of homeless women and children, the Christian nonprofit expanded its facilities with the buildout of the William A. Davis Women and Children's Center, a three-level, 22,000-square-foot facility that houses 106 beds in 25 semi-private rooms.

Since then, Grace Centers of Hope has expanded its offerings even more to include a life-skills program specifically for men and women who are struggling with chemical dependency, homelessness and abuse, and a program that provides residents who didn't graduate high school with the ability to obtain their GED during the course of their stay at its career and education center. On any given day, the nonprofit, located in downtown Pontiac, says it provides services to between 150 to 200 men, women and children and serves an average of 190,000 meals each year.

As with most nonprofits, assistance from volunteers is the life blood of Grace and the Notre Dame Prep community has been a constant presence there for many years. 

Just last weekend, juniors Elie Kim and Madeline Rennwald, both members of NDP's culinary club, and social studies teacher Tyler Yanik NDP'12, spent some quality time at Grace Centers cooking and serving meals for residents.  

Kim is the founder of the culinary club, which she says, has been involved at GCH in the past.

"Last year, the club hosted a bake sale and raised more than $500 for the center," she said. "We've also managed a food drive for them a year or so ago."

Kim adds that outside of her volunteer efforts connected with NDP, her family also has been volunteering at Grace Centers of Hope for many years. 

"This year, I plan on volunteering at GCH many more times," she said. "Cooking and serving meals for the residents is something I find very enjoyable because I love to cook and most importantly, because it helps others. The culinary club will be hosting another bake sale this year, and all proceeds will go to Grace Centers."

All of these volunteer efforts by Kim do not go unnoticed even though as a true Marist student, she does not seek recognition for her hard work. 

But sometimes she gets it anyway. In fact, a priest from the Rome, Italy-based PIME Missionaries who currently lives and serves at St. Hugo of the Hills in Bloomfield Hills, caught wind of the work Kim had been doing in the community.

Father Alessandro Canali, who's known the Kim family for a number of years, approached her about sharing her community service experiences with a church youth group he knows at a parish in Milan, Italy. One thing led to another and Kim soon found herself being interviewed by Canali to be rebroadcast in Milan.

"The interview was in English, but Fr. Canali translated it into Italian," she said. "We talked about my volunteer work in multiple organizations, one of them being Grace Centers of Hope, and how I tie it to my faith. The high school students in Italy are very interested in learning about high school service work in the U.S."

In addition to her recent work at Grace Centers, Kim talked about the work she does with GiGi’s Playhouse in Southfield, which has more than 50 locations across the country that help raise awareness for individuals with Down Syndrome.

"I am still very involved with GiGi's," said Kim, who's also a member of NDP's newspaper, UNICEF, podcast and pre-med clubs. "This year, I started to work with young kids and toddlers (ages 2-6) at GiGi's and I continue to write for their blog. Last August, I even interviewed Ms. [Kathleen] Offer, NDP's director of enrollment management, for the blog. She's a volunteer there and it's always great to see familiar faces at GiGi's, especially from NDP!"

For information on admission to Notre Dame Prep, please click here.

Comments or questions? mkelly@ndpma.org

About Notre Dame Preparatory School
"At Notre Dame Prep, we inspire our students to become the best versions of themselves. We challenge them through an experience of academic excellence, focused on active, project-based learning. We invite them to explore a world of opportunities beyond the classroom. We guide them as they grow in spirituality within a community strong in its Catholic and Marist identity."

Notre Dame Preparatory School is a private, Catholic, independent, coeducational day school located in Oakland County. Notre Dame Preparatory School's upper school enrolls students in grades nine through twelve and has been named one of the nation's best 50 Catholic high schools (Acton Institute) four times since 2005. Notre Dame Prep's middle and lower schools enroll students in pre-kindergarten through grade eight. All three schools are International Baccalaureate "World Schools." NDP is conducted by the Marist Fathers and Brothers and is accredited by the Independent Schools Association of the Central States and the National Association of Independent Schools. For more on Notre Dame Preparatory School, visit the school’s home page at www.ndpma.org.