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Hartwood hits Hollywood

Stafford teacher uses Oscar turn to give celebrities her class's environmental message

Date published: 2/26/2009

By Rob Hedelt

OSCAR ceremony celebrities from Anne Hathaway to Stephen Baldwin got the word from Hartwood Elementary School students this week that they'd better work harder to help the environment.

"I said that in many ways, they have more power than the president," said 10-year-old Mazzen Shalaby. "People care about them and notice what they do."

Which is why Shalaby's fourth-grade teacher, Leslie Lausten, and several members of Lausten's extended family were in Hollywood last weekend connecting with Oscar-going celebrities.

Lausten's sister and brother-in-law--Ed and Kathy Lawrence--own a Richmond business called Calypso Studios.

The company has created and is selling an environmentally friendly line of designer totes they think can be an attractive, convenient and affordable alternative to the plastic and paper bags that litter the landscape.

The S.H.O.P totes (Start Helping Our Planet) are a line of reusable totes that retail for under $30 and fold into a small, easy-to-carry case.

After showing the totes at a gift-industry trade show in Los Angeles recently, the couple was asked by "Secret Room Events," a celebrity-gifting company, to take part in the Oscar festivities.

The Lawrences said yes, and soon enough the trip became a family affair, with Lausten and the women's parents, Deal and Jane Flowers of Richmond, taking part.

All of them worked in a vendors' lounge on Friday and Saturday at a posh Beverly Hills hotel on Oscar weekend, giving away totes and pieces from the company's jewelry line to folks including "Breakfast Club" star Judd Nelson, former Chicago Bear Willie Gault, as well as film and TV personality Tila Tequila. Among some 200 other celebrities were members of the show "Orange County Housewives," the cast of "Camp Rock" and even "American Gladiators."

Aside from representing the company, Lausten, who has taught at Hartwood Elementary for 19 years, had another mission.

"I found a way to get my students involved," she said.

The class studied environmental topics all year, even creating a bird sanctuary as a class project. Before the trip, Lausten said she and the class talked about what they wanted to say about the environment to the trend-setting celebrities she would have access to.

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Date published: 2/26/2009