If you haven’t noticed the birdhouses around McCallum yet, it may be time to go outside and look up. By the time every Boy Scout reaches their 18th birthday, they are required to have completed a community service project to rise to the rank of Eagle Scout. For his Eagle project, senior Owen Lucente, a Troop Nine Scout approaching his adulthood, decided to lead a group in building birdhouses as his project, and setting them up around school.

“It was my first idea,” Lucente said. “I thought it was not enough for an Eagle project, but when it was all said and done, I tied it into McCallum, the bird club and nature.”

On a sunny Sunday afternoon in August, Lucente and a group of about 25 volunteers, Scouts and bird fans, came together to construct the birdhouses, including sophomore Miles Dreher, a Boy Scout himself.

“He asked a ton of people to come help out,” Dreher said. “We all showed up, and he had all the materials; all we had to do is build it and paint it.”

Dreher remarked on the project’s process and result.

“There’s a lot of people helping out, which is kind of cool,” he said. “Maybe it won’t have a big, significant impact, but I think it’ll make it a little bit nicer and bring some birds in.”

After the birdhouses were put together and decorated, the last step was to hang them around campus. The houses are stationed all throughout the courtyards of McCallum waiting in trees for their new inhabitants.

The history of the Lucente family with birds wasn’t, however, written overnight. Lucente’s older sister and Mac alum, Gillian, is the founder of McCallum’s Feathered Friends bird club.

“I formed it to get other bird lovers to see that they weren’t alone,” Gillian said. “To learn about birds, help birds around the school, and make it a safer place for them.”

Gillian, now a college freshman studying animal science at Texas State University, was her brother’s inspiration for his birdhouse project, and assisted in its process.

“I helped him get an understanding on what the club knew about where each bird normally goes around the school,” she said.

One of the main aspects of the project was the idea that it brought the community together, and produced a direct benefit on McCallum, all under Owen’s leadership.

“I hope it brings something to the courtyards,” he said. “I hope people respect them and the signs, and I hope it brings some awareness to the bird club.”

Owen said that his hope for the future is that the birdhouses will live on and be appreciated by all, including McCallum students long after they graduate.

“We built them to last, so I hope that I can come back and see them still here.”