Our latest New Yorker of the Week is giving the gift of empowerment. NY1's John Schiumo filed the following report.

At the Hawthorne Country Day School in East Harlem, special needs students are preparing special gift bags for the elderly in their community.

"They are really getting back more than they are giving," says New Yorker of the Week Joseph Sprung. "The feeling that they get when they take that physical bear and that card that they created to somebody else is a very empowering feeling."

Joseph Sprung has been helping children get that special feeling for the past two years through a program he created called Bear Givers.

An accountant, he's given the class of special needs students, many of them autistic, a grant that gives them the opportunity to do art, to write, and deliver teddy bears.

"They are my favorite stuffed animals," says Hawthorne Country Day School student Billy Colliton.

The students at Hawthorne and the seniors were all smiles when they held the bears. Some were even brought to tears.

"I think he is lovely and I'm going to give it to my great grandchild," says Greater Harlem Nursing Home resident Doris Kelsey.

Sprung's grants, ranging from $400 to $1,000 a month, go to 20 schools. And it's not just about bears. The students get to have their art work shown to a large audience.

"We take the art of the students and we rent gallery space, and the students are the stars of the evening, and all the proceeds from the sale of the art go to the school and the children are really giving back to their school and the children feel that they are being recognized for their talents on one special evening," says Sprung.

"What he is doing is really amazing and is needed especially for our population. We don't have so many opportunities to interact with people in the community. That's very meaningful for the students as well as the community," says Dr. Amoy Hugh-Pennie of the Hawthorne Country Day School.

So for giving the gift of empowerment, not to mention all of those furry friends, Joseph Sprung is the latest New Yorker of the Week.

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