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Miami Palmetto High School senior Jake Arnold is always finding ways to help the community. In ninth grade, he collected canned goods and perishable goods, put them into Thanksgiving baskets and gave them to a group from Temple Beth Am and Christ Fellowship to be distributed.
“I would ask them for the goods and would go around collecting if they wanted to give,” he says. “I also put cards in the basket saying Happy Thanksgiving.”
From tenth grade on, he participated in an event sponsored by temples around the community through the Greater Miami Jewish Federation called Everything But the Turkey.
“We make pies, and they would be transferred to a place to be baked and distributed to the needy,” he says.
When he’s not helping feed the community, Arnold helps by tutoring through Mu Alpha Theta, the math honor society.
“We went to Palmetto Middle to mentor and tutor the kids for math,” he says. “I would do that every Thursday.”
He also tutors in music for Tri-M, the music honor society, sponsored by the Director of Bands, Ms. Serrano.
“We go once a month, and we tutor students,” he says. “I am a trumpet player, and we practice how to hit certain notes and tone quality. This year we are working to expand where we go to and include other middle schools.”
He says they are also working on tutoring at Palmetto Elementary.
“It has what I believe is a very good music program,” he says. “We try to go when the teacher has time for us to go there. If we need to go before a concert, we can go a few days before. We can help at the concert as well.”
He says they want to encourage the children’s passion for music.
“And we want to help their teacher, Mr. Diez,” he says.
He is concerned about music programs in local schools.
“We are trying to help, but every year it gets smaller and smaller with less kids wanting to join band,” he says. “It hurts the high school too.”
He’d love to expand participation in music at the elementary and middle school levels so that students will continue through high school.
“I started playing music in second grade with Palmetto Elementary and went to Palmetto Middle,” he says. “I want to give back to the schools that helped me in music.”
At Palmetto he’s a member of the Symphonic Band and the Marching Band. Currently, Marching Band is an after-school club. Arnold actively recruits new marching band members. The band goes to almost all the home games and an occasional away game.
“Our home stadium is Tropical Park,” he says. “Any game at Tropical we will be going to with the football team.”
He is the Media Officer in charge of social media for the marching band.
Arnold is working to increase the size of the band that was decimated by COVID.
“We are bringing it back in terms of numbers,” he says. “After COVID, we had like 20-25 kids. This year we have 40-45 kids.”
His hard work was noticed. Last year, he was awarded the Most Outstanding Musician for the junior class, and he received the National Hispanic Recognition award for his high academic achievements.
In college, he’d like to major in Computer Science and be a member of the marching band.
He’s applying to the University of Central Florida, the University of Miami, the University of Florida, Florida State and Florida International University. Then he’d like to earn a master’s degree in computer science.
Linda Rodriguez Bernfeld
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