During a Celtics game on January 20, seniors at Newton South High School Sam Klein and Vassili Syssoev received honors through the Boston Celtics’ Heroes Among Us program for their work in community service.
Co-founders of Student Landscape, a student-led landscaping company in the Greater Boston Area, Klein and Syssoev began their Community First program, offering monthly free services to members of the community who are unable to access services on their own. Klein said that the idea came to him during a job where a member of the community ran into an issue on account of their age.
“I was working for this woman, she was pretty old and it was a long turnover project, which is pretty normal,” he said. “I put the dirt in a bunch of lawn bags and left them on the curb. About a week after the job, she sent me a text saying that the city wouldn’t take the bags and that she had to move them or else they were going to fine her. She’s like eighty years old, she can’t lift that, so she asked me if I could help her and I was like, ‘Yeah, of course.’ So I came back and I got it into a bunch of smaller bags, that way the city would take it.”
Similarly, Syssoev also said that a specific instance had motivated him to work together with Klein on their shared interest.
“Pretty much every spring and fall, one of my neighbors [who] lives directly across the street is very small, maybe five feet, 80 pounds, and she doesn’t speak very good English. So hiring people for her was really really hard. I was kind of scared that she was gonna get scammed by these people because she just couldn’t really support [herself],” he said. “So I started working for her and helping her out as much as I could: picking up her leaves, mowing the lawn, shoveling her driveway whenever it was possible. And when Sam told me [his] story, I realized, why not try to do something for the community? Especially when nothing like this is being done in Newton.”
And with that, the Community First program was conceived.
“I realized there’s a lot of people [who] can’t do this kind of work for themselves, but they still need it,” Klein said. “It inspired me to make a difference and branch out to a lot of people that couldn’t hire me otherwise.”
Syssoev said that with their shared strengths, they were able to put their plan into action.
“I saw a lot of potential and what we could grow as the amount of experience that we both had,” he said. “I knew that if we just tried to put our ideas together then we could make something special.”
Since then, Student Landscape has received widespread recognition, not only by the aforementioned Heroes Among Us program, but also by CBS News Boston in late November 2022.
Syssoev’s father, Sergei Syssoev, said that the work of Klein and Syssoev is completely authentic to the two of them.
“We are not pushing our kids anywhere,” he said. “It’s their own decision and we are very proud. They’re making the right decisions.”
In addition to that, Klein’s mother, Darci Klein, said that this initiative is especially valuable for the young people of Student Landscape.
“It’s really great. I’m very proud of them,” she said. “And I think it’s a pretty good lesson that if you work hard and try to do good, positive things will come from it.”
The work of Student Landscape is also accredited to its employees, all of whom are high school students at Newton South. Project Manager and senior Daniel Brown said that he has always enjoyed doing the community service work and continues to this day.
“I want to help people out a lot—it really makes me feel good,” he said. “I felt like doing my first community service job was a feeling like no other, so once I kept doing them over and over again, it just feels better and better and better. Doing them just feels so good.”
Employee and junior at Newton South Max Kamen said that since he will not be graduating this year, he plans to play a greater role in the business and continue the work Klein and Syssoev have already done.
“[I plan to] just keep doing what Sam was doing with all his clients, and to keep going with all the community service and everything. Just living up to his name.” he said.
Syssoev said that the work he and Klein have done with Student Landscape has been very fulfilling, and he hopes they can inspire others to also strive to do good in the community.
“Changing someone’s life isn’t that hard,” he said. “Through the community outreach, there’s so many people that we have affected in a positive way. I hope it inspires other people our age to realize that making someone’s day isn’t that hard, making someone’s week, month, whatever it is. Besides the business part, what I’ve learned through giving back to the community has really changed my life for the better.”
Bella Ishanyan is a junior at Newton South High School and editor in chief of the Newton South Lion’s Roar.