Gift of
Giving Back
Bethel Park residents and sisters, Lauren Zabkar McLean and
Emily Zabkar Nugent, receive Jefferson Awards for their local volunteer efforts.
BY W. B. FRESA
A
ccording to Lauren Zabkar McLean and Emily Zabkar
Nugent, the notion of giving back was taught early and often
in their home growing up in Bethel Park. Their parents were
hard workers who stressed service to others.
Recently, McLean and Nugent were each honored with a Jefferson
Award for their public service charities—a diaper pantry and an
organization to help women cope with the loss of a newborn.
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The Jefferson Award is a prestigious national recognition system
honoring community and public volunteerism in America. But of
course the award was not Nugent’s motivation when she began
looking for a way to give back. “Our church tried different outreach
opportunities but nothing really stuck,” she says. “Then one day at
a church meeting, while pregnant with my second child, our pastor
talked about the needs of babies, specifically their need for diapers. I
researched the issue and just like that, it happened.”